Editing 2654: Chemtrails

{{comic
| number    = 2654
| date      = August 3, 2022
| title     = Chemtrails
| image     = chemtrails.png
| titletext = Ants have reverse chemtrails--regular citizens spraying chemicals everywhere they go to control the government.
}}

==Explanation==

{{w|Entomologist}}s study insects. {{w|Ant}}s are insects that leave chemical trails to and from food sources or other events. These chemical trails can guide other ants in their colony, for instance, to return to food.  Biologists call such signaling chemicals {{w|pheromones}}.  This comic uses the word chemtrail as a shortening of chemical trail. [[Cueball]] is intentionally conflating ant chemical trails with {{w|chemtrails}}, the subject of a fallacious conspiracy theory that the government controls the population by spraying toxic or mind-/body-transformative chemicals from high altitude aircraft. 

That myth may be partly based on the practice of {{w|cloud seeding}}, which uses chemical flares containing silver nitrate to attempt to increase precipitation,[https://www.vox.com/videos/23290459/cloud-seeding-manmade-rain-future-perfect] on studies of chemical mind control among ants,[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022191016301640] or on the effects of the common parasite ''{{w|toxoplasma gondii}}'' on cats' prey. Despite [[1677: Contrails|occasional conflation]], chemtrails are distinct from "contrails," short for "condensation trails," which are cloud-like lines in the sky created by airplane engines. Such linear cloud formations only sometimes arise from temperature and pressure disturbances of the passing engines, rather than any deliberate release, but are highly visible in the right conditions under flightpaths, and may have the appearance of "spraying" action. {{w|Nucleation#Examples of the nucleation of fluids (gases and liquids)|Vapor nucleation}} is central to both cloud seeding and contrails. People sometimes attempt chemical manipulation of unwitting people in small areas (such as scent-based marketing, commercial space scent utilization, or wearing scented products.[https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/3469-smells-shoppers-spend-more.html]) There is very little evidence that sophisticated mind control posited by chemtrail conspiracists is possible, even after extensive research.[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Poisoner_in_Chief/U6iDDwAAQBAJ]

[[Ponytail]] is an entomologist, studying chemically mediated cooperative ant navigation. [[Cueball]] knows she will be annoyed when he tells her, "So, I hear you're really into chemtrails?" Indeed, he gets the reaction he hoped for when she objects strongly and rejects this with a loud, "'''No!!'''" The choice of terminology is often a sore spot for those who study a particular field in depth, for example entomological discussions of "slave-making" in socially parasitic species.[https://evolve.community.uaf.edu/2015/04/23/emantcipation-when-captured-ants-rise-against-their-captors/] [[Randall]] writes in the caption that such misuse is how to annoy people like Ponytail.

The title text humorously contrasts individual ants instinctively deciding how the whole colony behaves by using chemicals to indicate routes to food or dangers to motivate the colony to react to their individual experiences, with the human fear of loss of personal independence by being regulated by otherwise disconnected ruling elites, as depicted in the ant/technology interaction speculative fiction-themed [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fISvc-yUU1A "Infrared"] music video by the alt-rock band ''Placebo''.

Ants are a recurring theme, as are those who study them. See for instance [[638: The Search]] which specifically deals with ants' pheromone trails or [[1610: Fire Ants]]. Chemtrails were also the subject of [[966: Jet Fuel]], [[1677: Contrails]], and were mentioned in [[1803: Location Reviews]]. This comic has a similar format to [[2036: Edgelord]]: a simple one-panel interaction consisting of a (likely deliberate) misuse of a term in regards to a professional's work, followed immediately by the professional's upset outburst, and Randall's caption spelling out "How to annoy" the professional. Both seem related to Randall's [[:Category:My Hobby|hobbies]], as he seems to think a lot about how to annoy specific groups of people, perhaps in an attempt to minimize annoyances.

==Transcript==

:[Cueball stands talking to Ponytail, who has her arms raised and has small lines above her head to indicate annoyance.]
:Cueball: So, I hear you're really into chemtrails?
:Ponytail: '''''No!!'''''

:[Caption below the panel:]
:How to annoy entomologists who study ant navigation

==Trivia==
*Whether ant gland secretion signalling is {{w|Turing completeness|Turing-equivalent}} is explored in Douglas Hofstadter's ''{{w|Gödel, Escher, Bach|Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid}}''.
*Ponytail may conceivably be a professional entomologist who once worked with an editor who inserted the word "chemtrails" in one of her [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00359-019-01363-z comparative physiology] or [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10071-020-01354-7 ''Animal Cognition''] drafts competing before a peer review panel with papers by [https://bio.kuleuven.be/ento/pdfs/billen_procnev_2006_signal_variety.pdf Johan Bilen] of the Leuven University Zoological Institute and Harvard's [https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674045880 Rüdiger Wehner].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Ants]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]
[[Category:Biology]]
[[Category:Puns]]
[[Category:Conspiracy theory]]
[[Category:Aviation]]