Formication - idle thoughts

And... the little black ants got into the black sesame crackers!  But only just... I was able to swoop them up, and feverishly inspect and shake every single cracker to ensure antlessness, because all the black sesame seeds looked pretty convincingly like the ants) and thus all ended well - except that little black ants leapt onto my hand, and ran up towards my elbow, and for about half an hour afterwards I was thinking every air current blowing against me (it's a blowy day today) was an invisible remnant ant, and brushing it off me,.

Question: if something is part of a hive mind (which I think ants must be) does that make it less problematic or more to kill them?  (Yes, those early, visible ants who were venturing onto my forearm were swiftly brushed into oblivion.)  Less, because it is an unimportant side-issue to the hive-mind, of no greater weight than losing a few cells? or more, because the hive-mind is aware of every component death, and ask not for whom the bell tolls, etc?  (This is random idle thinking, not science. Though I'd welcome the science!)