Oh man I experience totally the opposite. It&#x27;s a trope on here, but, go to Burning Man. It&#x27;s almost a definition of a human swarm, but it works specifically because everyone is empowered, informed, and relied on to resolve issues involving themselves.<p>I also a see a parallel in how (at least one) Japanese company does their robotic assembly line: They have one or more human-operated lines, because if you don&#x27;t know how to do it well, how can you teach robots how to do it well?<p>There are lots of reasons you&#x27;re wrong. One is that the situation you&#x27;ve described still requires <i>someone</i> to understand what the swarm agent needs to do - why not have that be the agent, as well? They have the most up-to-date and relevant information about their situation.<p>Another reason you&#x27;re wrong is that &quot;swarm&quot; doesn&#x27;t consist of insects. The first software swarms were actually birds.<p>Another reason you&#x27;re wrong is that while swarms allow for success through mass action of dumb agents, the swarms actually improve as you improve the individual agents - compare the simplest ant-algorithm applied to network connectivity with one wherein the individual agents mutate and learn. Second one does a better job.<p>...Another reason you&#x27;re wrong is that swarm agents don&#x27;t have &quot;paths&quot; picked for them. That would (for example, in ant swarm path finding) actually prevent the swarm processing from occurring. Rather, the agents apply principles (in software, an algorithm) to the situation they&#x27;re in. In other words, the global plan is in fact relying on the individuals &quot;going off course&quot; and trying to improve the overall situation.<p>This all actually reminds me of both &quot;Why I Like Java&quot; and &quot;Conservative vs Liberal Programming&quot; - in that it&#x27;s basically about: Do I prevent bad actors from doing harm, or do I empower good actors to make more good?<p>If one bricklayer going off-course in detrimental way derails your plan, you don&#x27;t have enough good bricklayers. Fire the bad ones and&#x2F;or hire more good ones.