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A comment on Ant mill. Parent comment

Re:Ant mill by perihelions on Saturday January 22, 2022 @02:40PM (#30040090)
Idea: spend one neuron to track how often the ant thinks it's turning right (left). The input could be differential motion between sets of legs, or an internal accelerometer (if it exists). It takes very little storage to track an exponential moving average (just one persistent variable),

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_average#Exponential_mov...

If the average "winding number" goes very high over a period of some minutes, then you're probably moving in circles.

But then there's this failure mode: figure-8 loops...

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Re:Ant mill by maxbond on Saturday January 22, 2022 @03:38PM (#30040600)
I have seen figure-8 ant mills on YouTube, fwiw. It involved a "going underground" step, eg, go through a tunnel, pop out, turn and walk over the tunnel, turn and go back into the tunnel. I'll see if I can find it again.
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Re:Ant mill by BeFlatXIII on Saturday January 22, 2022 @07:44PM (#30042477)
Or ants on a Klein bottle.
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Re:Ant mill by mFixman on Saturday January 22, 2022 @03:02PM (#30040321)
What if an ant is trying to go up a steep mound in a spiral?
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Re:Ant mill by perihelions on Saturday January 22, 2022 @03:08PM (#30040376)
Then it's being an idiot. Ants can easily climb vertical walls (and trees).
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Re:Ant mill by BeFlatXIII on Saturday January 22, 2022 @07:45PM (#30042488)
They can even travel fully upside-down on my ceilings. Cliff overhangs are no obstacle for them.
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