Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/05/13/video-decapitated-wasp-grabs-its-own-head-and-flies-away.html
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I assume that this is automatic rather than purposeful behavior. That is to say that the back part of the wasp has some automatic responses to stimuli, which it continues to execute, rather ineptly, without its head. If this is a predatory wasp that captures other arthropods such as spiders to lay its eggs in, then the behavior might be “If you feel something nearby that could be a spider, try to grab it with both front limbs, then fly off with it to your burrow.”
It’s possible that the wasp later attempted to lay eggs in its own head, which would really take this to the next level of the macabre.
If my interpretation is correct, this says some interesting things about how much of the wasp’s behaviors are distributed about its body, rather than controlled by its brain. But maybe that shouldn’t come as a surprise: we know that male mantises are capable of completing a simple task (i.e. copulation) and in some cases have even been observed to initiate copulation after being decapitated. That displays a degree of single-mindedness that is remarkable even among male organisms, but it does suggest that insects can perform a variety of relatively complex behaviors independent of central control.
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A dab of glue, it will be fine.
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It’s just a flesh wound
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"All I can think about is how I’m very glad humans aren’t also capable of walking around headless. "
Give Adam Roberts’ Land of the Headless a read; criminals have all of their neurological functions and consciousness downloaded onto a small computer, which is attached to the top of the spinal column, and then they are decapitated.
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Probably. It is creepy how the three parts of an insect can operate independently of each other. I remember catching a shiny green soldier beetle, only to discover in horror that his abdomen has been hollowed out by some parasite!!! But he was running around like crazy… I ended up doing a coup de grace to end any suffering.
I am curious how insects work, though. Like ants - they seem to follow a programming, and can be ordered around via pheromones. Can we ever decode that and reprogram ants to do things? How the heck did they learn to do the complex things they do. It has to be an instinctual thing, but how does that work?
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…yeah, that’s enough internet for me today, I think.
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Mutant bee has a healing factor.
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Have you ever seen a man eat his own head?
Wasp: “Cool! Now I get to see what my rear end looks like!”
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As long as the wasp still dies, cool.
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I’ve not heard of any insects having more than one brain 
, but could whatever serves as a wasp’s brain actually stretch from its noggin to other parts of its body?
As all the ‘shake it off, it’s just a flesh wound’ jokes have already been made:
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… OK that’s enough, I’m out 
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“Mount up! We’ll head it off at the pass!”
It’s kind of amazing, actually. Even without a brain to provide higher mental processes, there was still enough synaptic function in the headless body to hang a Trump 2024 flag from the nest.
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I recall an anecdote about a shark that was caught with its own entrails (which the angler had kept as bait, after throwing the rest of the ostensible carcass back into the briny deep)
