The organ we have to provide us with current acceleration information is quite complicated. Because an ant queen didn't seem to notice when I picked up the bottle she was in, I have a suspicion that ants don't really care about acceleration and therefore can't tell where it's up and where it's down.
Am I right? If not, how do they sense acceleration?
Answer
According to Clinical Neurophysiology of the Vestibular System By Robert William Baloh, Vicente Honrubia, page 8, the vestibular system (animals' "accelerometer") is as old as 600 million years and is present in invertebrates.
I assume (without a precise source) that this is especially important for flying insects (after all, accelerometers were engineered for flying machines in the first place!) and that the ant didn't respond because the acceleration to which you submitted it was not deemed harmful.
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