Are The Bugs The Highest Life Form?

With all of the Rampant-Free-Will vs. Unity-In-Oppression of the universe we're creating, I'd like to start a discussion about the only race that may be able to transcend all of this and turn out to really be the most 'advanced' faction of all.

Eriochrome put it well in an email to me:

"So I know that Space Bugs were discussed last year, but I was thinking along another line that I thought I might drop in to you.  With a Biological Built fixed heirachery, no infighting, and no empathy they actually could represent the highest form of order or true empire in the galaxy.  Every cog in the structure does exactly as it is supposed to given its instincts and experiences without desire for advancement or fear of death.  An empire built on continuous expansion, terra forming, and livestock farming what ever the world supports while undergoing restructuring for optimal bug habitation be it sentient or not.

For play features, I was thinking of so me of the robotic style rules were the lower units are given various "programs" where they are given zones to attack or defend but those can be overwritten with new programs in the presence of higher forms."

I'm all for this 100%!

With the Dogmatists fighting the personifications of Free Will Unrestrained, I really do want to explore the idea that the Bugs represent the only true ideal. Albeit one humans and human-like beings can't ever hope to mimic. They eat, they nest, they reproduce. Better and more efficiently than anyone else and without the burdens of self-consciousness that plague the rest of us.

I don't have any firm opinions beyond that. Except that there be no 'brain bugs', smart 'queens', or 'Picard of Borg' in the mix. Truely A L I E N! The bugs communicate with various chemical and electromagnetic signals. But their 'brain' is made up of every member of the swarm. If a 'problem' (us) is encountered, mutations are triggered until a solution is found. Then the mutation is replicated en  masse until a new problem is found.

There is no joy, no hate, no empathy for what's eaten. There is intelligence that can be seen en masse, but not accessed or communicated with.  We can understand it to some extent, but It can not understand us in any way that we would comprehend. They can not be fought with words!

This poses a HUGE threat to the Colserans. As they can't tempt the swarm. It has nothing they want except biomass and raw materials to be ingested. But the Cols can't help but try to 'convince' it of how awesome they are. Humans, at least, see the swarm for what it is and simply fight it without the drama. They treat is as a natural force that may be deflected -- onto the Colserans if at all possible. :)

As for the 'swarms', I like 40K's tentacles of intergalactic doom less than I do the idea of millions of individual nests where new queens hatch and swarm inexorably towards the next world. Heinlein had it pretty spot on.

Discuss!