Earlier quoted context omitted.
The really interesting question is why don't we see these amazingly detailed and precise parasitic mechanisms elsewhere, like in mammals? Are we just doing a terrible job of finding them, or is there something more interesting going on? Del Giudice recently published a paper arguing that the baroque complexity of non-insect nervous systems may in part be an anti-parasite mechanism, by making it too hard for a distrib…
Toxoplasmosis is (not) your friend here [0] [0] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/toxoplasmosis...
Toxo is the exception that proves the rule here. Toxo is perhaps the best known example of any parasite having human behavioral effects, yet the causal role of toxo is still not accepted, and what it's postulated to affect is pretty random: schizophrenia, car accidents, that sort of thing. That doesn't look like any kind of planned behavioral control which might affect toxo reproduction. It just looks like a parasite causing some damage post-infection. It's unclear if it even manages to replicate the mouse effect of making humans more attracted to cats (since we contract it mostly from cats, obvious confound). You certainly cannot compare its capabilities, in rodents or primates, to the astonishingly precise and complicated behaviors that insect parasites can orchestrate. And it's not like humans in the wild don't host plenty of parasites!