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Slime Mold Mind Control
Topic Started: Apr 8 2011, 03:33 PM (900 Views)
Cephalian
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The Future is Wild featured a slime mold that was able to get into the brains of megasquid and cause them to go berserk until they coughed up the slime mold elsewhere. I'm just wondering if that sort of thing is even remotely within the realm of possibility - I know that modern day viruses can do that to ants (Making them stand on top of grass waiting for sheep to eat them), but I'm specifically curious if a slime mold could manage such a thing.
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Ook
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there are more parasites like this,some of them causes that fish stays on surface and wait till the heron came.. or species of fungus,which attacks caterpillar of butterfly,and in the last stadium,the caterpillar dug itself into dirt,leaving only tail on surface,where the sporocarp grow...or another species of ..something xD..which causes that ants abdomen looks like berry,which certain birds eat..

and dont forgot Toxoplasmosis
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FallingWhale
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Making something uncomfortable makes it angry.

Why they don't end up on the ground and die is the mockible part.
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SabrWolf
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Given the sheer number of molds that can cause strange (in fact completely non-beneficial) behavior I think that a slime mold could totally evolve those same traits that effect behavior in organisms.
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Cephalian
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So it seems general consensus is yes, this could happen. In that case, my follow up question is simple: how much influence over behavior could a slime mold reasonably have?

Also, since I know very little about them: How fast could a slime mold reasonably "move".
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SabrWolf
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How Much Influence:
Right now there are molds that make insects behave in a certain way so they can be eaten by a particular animal so they (the mold) can continue their life cycle, right? Reasonably speaking I think the mold's control could be completely insane but the exact nature of the control (what, exactly, it makes the host animal do) would be limited to whatever would cause the mold's life cycle to continue.
Note: If this is for what I'm thinking it's for, you'll be able to get the desired effect you're looking for. lol

How Fast:
This one I'm not sure about. Found a website that said the present day slime mold moves 1mm/hr (but I'm not sure how accurate that number is). I think that the slime mold would have to be fast enough to be able to catch it's host creature though if it were to survive the evolutionary process. SO, to that end, the answer I am comfortable giving is "Fast Enough".
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SabrWolf
Apr 8 2011, 08:29 PM
How Much Influence:
Right now there are molds that make insects behave in a certain way so they can be eaten by a particular animal so they (the mold) can continue their life cycle, right? Reasonably speaking I think the mold's control could be completely insane but the exact nature of the control (what, exactly, it makes the host animal do) would be limited to whatever would cause the mold's life cycle to continue.
Note: If this is for what I'm thinking it's for, you'll be able to get the desired effect you're looking for. lol

How Fast:
This one I'm not sure about. Found a website that said the present day slime mold moves 1mm/hr (but I'm not sure how accurate that number is). I think that the slime mold would have to be fast enough to be able to catch it's host creature though if it were to survive the evolutionary process. SO, to that end, the answer I am comfortable giving is "Fast Enough".
Yes, this is for the idea I mentioned last night. But also curious for other reasons, thanks for the response!

Off Topic: when are you posting some of you own alterations? Because the one's you've mentioned to me sound awesome.
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Are you plausible?

The types of commands a slime mold would give would likely be rather simple, IMO. For example, it couldn't ay, "Go to the Eiffel Tower and paint a picture of a pony while standing on your head." Instead it would say something like, "behave completely irrationally, at which point you-- by random circumstance-- find yourself in Paris, upside-down, and with a horse on canvas.

What's much more likely is something like, "Walk as far as you can until you sneeze me out of you," or, "Go someplace with lots of life forms and aggressively sneeze me out onto as many of them as you can." Our human minds may interpret these basic instructions in strange ways, our own psychology augmenting or even complicating the instructions.
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food for thought
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Canis Lupis
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I'd say that this would probably only work on small creatures with a relatively simplistic nervous system, such as arthropods and some fish.

I honestly doubt that the fungus would have a huge effect on something with a highly complex nervous system (like the completely implausible megasquid were perported to have and like us).

The simpler the mind, the easier it is for something to take it over. Whereas something complex is, well, way to complex to be worth the effort.
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SabrWolf
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"What's much more likely is something like, "Walk as far as you can until you sneeze me out of you," or, "Go someplace with lots of life forms and aggressively sneeze me out onto as many of them as you can." Our human minds may interpret these basic instructions in strange ways, our own psychology augmenting or even complicating the instructions.

Most definitely! I think that would be the most interesting part of running the exper-*COUGH* ... I mean studying the effects of the poor unfortunate souls to contract the mold.
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The simpler the mind, the easier it is for something to take it over. Whereas something complex is, well, way to complex to be worth the effort.

Yeah... maybe.

But if the mold were to evolve alongside one organism in particular it would have no choice but to accommodate the more complex nervous system. It's not out of the question is all I'm saying. But I will agree that it is unlikely and would require a certain set of circumstances.
Edited by SabrWolf, Apr 8 2011, 10:12 PM.
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Are you plausible?

I think it would also depend on the type of activity the slime mold wants to prompt. It may increase or decrease chances for neurochemical processes to prompt irrational fears or promptings.

Also, there's this and this for further reading. On that second article, I particularly recommend clicking the link to David Brin's The Giving Plague. It's an excellent story and I'm glad to stumble upon an online version of it.
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Ànraich
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Given the viruses and fungi on Earth that use insects to get eaten or taken to more favorable positions to release spores from, I would say it's certainly plausible. As has been stated, it would probably work best on simplistic nervous systems. Insects, maybe small animals. More complex ones could be controlled too, but I doubt it would be as effective. Seems to me like it's more like a stimulation of behavior scenario than a mind control one. The fungi itself isn't sentient (although some slime molds have been shown to process and store information about their environment collectively, so it might be possible), it's just using the host like a vehicle. Going from one place to a better place. Works better on organisms that function mainly on instinct, but for those like humans with free will it will likely be more like a temptation. A strange urge or craving, not necessarily mind control but anyone will snap eventually. Unless, you know, the organism dies or is discovered before then. It would be risky.
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