This metaphor has always bugged me. If we noticed some ants somewhere that, over the last thousand years, got way better at building colonies I think we'd at least be interested, if not concerned. No matter how long we leave them, ants will not figure out how to build their own JWST.

Human intelligence seems as though it is fundamentally different, in that we can preserve and build on previous knowledge. So I'm pretty sure that aliens, detecting intelligent life, wouldn't just be like "oh, just some ants." Or if they are, we better hope we don't find ourselves in their pantry.