Chapter 290 - Mystery of the Nerves (2/2)

“Because an insect horde doesn’t possess intelligence. Insect-type monsters are just machines of flesh and bones, and each of them has a command. They don’t have consciousness, intelligence, or the concept of life and death. When bullets rip through their bodies, they do not feel fear.

“I think that this is the most terrifying thing of all.

“If we can give lower lifeforms some intelligence, we might be able to end the Monster War in another fashion. We don’t have to give them a lot of intelligence, but just make them understand the value of life, the terror of human weapons, and the simple principle that becoming the servants of humans is better than becoming the enemies of humans.”

Meng Chao was not too sure about that.

With just tens of millions of people, even if they could conquer the monsters, they were destined to not be able to occupy the entire planet, because it had a lot of spirit energy, and everyone’s evolution speed was incredibly fast.

This was general knowledge.

When they faced the question of how they should conquer and rule over the Other World, people from different occupations, different factions of power, and those with different interests would give different answers.

In Agricultural University, aka Monster University, the argument that giving monsters a certain degree of intelligence and turning beasts and monsters into spirit beasts and pets so that they could become the vanguards of their kings was very popular. They would become the fighters in Earth’s army, humanity’s servants, tools, companions, and comrades, and like that, the humans would eventually conquer the Other World.

If Meng Chao was in Gao Ye’s shoes, he would probably think like that too.

However, when he remembered the damage caused by the Nine Great Supernatural Entities in his previous life, he felt a little uneasy.

“I still can’t imagine just what sort of impact it would have on our civilization if monsters who are more intelligent than humans appeared,” Meng Chao mumbled.

“Meng Chao, you’re thinking too far ahead,” Gao Ye said. “Neural information transmission speed is just the foundation for the birth of intelligence. It doesn’t mean that when you provide myelin sheaths for sufficiently thick nerve fibers, you will instantly give intelligence to a creature.

“The brain structure of Giant Sandworms is very primitive. It’s completely different from that of humans’ incredibly advanced brain. Even if their neural transmission speed starts moving at a high pace in a complicated and large neural network, without a real brain analyzing and organizing everything, that information will still not produce real intelligence.

“Even if we gave Giant Sandworms larger brains through genetic modification, it’d just be hardware.

“If we look purely at the hardware, the brain size, number of neurons, and brain circuits in prehistoric humans during the stone age billions of years ago was about the same as those of a modern person.

“But the humans during the stone age definitely did not possess the intelligence of modern humans, because intelligence isn’t formed by the clash of nerve impulses. It’s an accumulation of knowledge through billions of years and the summation of all sorts of complicated societal relationships.

“If you throw a normal and healthy modern human infant into the wild and he doesn’t die but lives to eighteen years old, it’ll be impossible for him to have intelligence.

“If you place a strong prehistoric man from the stone age into the current Dragon City, he will not pose any threat.

“So, if you think that when Giant Sandworms possess sufficiently advanced nerves and brains, they will instantly gain intelligence that is so great that they will be able to understand human civilization as well as possess desires and ambitions like humans, that is just alarmist thinking.

“At the end of the day, intelligence is not a necessity when it comes to survival. If Giant Sandworms can live comfortably by eating trash and rocks, there will be no need for them to gain intelligence. They’ll have no interest in it, and they’ll never gain it.”

Meng Chao thought about Gao Ye’s words seriously.

He had to admit that the Giant Sandworm expert’s words made sense.

Then, just what was the Giant Sandworm that evolved into a Supernatural Entity in his previous life?

While he was thinking about it, two researchers wearing negative pressure protective clothing walked out of the lab and handed them the test results.

Gao Ye looked at them, and his expression turned dark. He cussed under his breath.

“What is it?” Meng Chao quickly asked.

“I knew it. Someone injected a virus into the Giant Sandworms!”

Meng Chao thought about it. “Are you sure it was done by humans and they didn’t get infected by some virus around them?”

“That’s hardly possible. There are around a dozen natural subtypes of mutated rabies, and they can all be transmitted between humans and other creatures, but the new mutated rabies subtype discovered in the Giant Sandworms cannot be transferred to the human body. It’s not something produced by natural mutation. It’s something created in a human lab.”