They know they're watching ants getting burnt under a magnifying glass, but they don't care.

Here is an example: Have you ever watched ants?

She just found it interesting: like watching ants squabble, colony against colony; vicious but not important.

Q.: Watching ants traveling in a line, I noticed they meet head-on for a moment, then continue on their way.

I paced up and down in front of the house, and I paused to watch ants stripping a dead pigeon to the bones.

It is the equivalent of the child lying on the lawn on a dreamy summer day, watching earwigs and ants in the grass as they act out another, entirely microscopic existence.

I could never fill my belly with meat by watching ants at work; and so, with a sigh of regret, I arose to leave.

Killeen stood back and watched ants swarming over the face of the body.

"If you really watch ants you'll see that they aren't very well organized, child," Nonnus said.

This was observed in a careful study from the University of Aarhus by watching neighboring ants in their environment as well as in a laboratory.