HONEY BEE LANGUAGE?
 
   Last fall someone bemoaned the fact that most discussion on the BEE-L
network centered too much on practical matters and too little on more
substantive issues.  This past week a focus on the bee language controversy
seems to have altered that picture.  Since I have been center-stage much of
the time (though fairly quiet, for me), I feel it appropriate to provide
comment.
 
   To begin, consider a Bruno Latour comment (as on p. 353 in our book,
ANATOMY OF A CONTROVERSY.... --- cited earlier in the abstract posted):
"We have to understand first how many elements can be brought to bear on a
controversy; once this is understood, the other problems will be easier to
solve."
 
   In the exchange we have had about bee "language" over the BEE-L and
SOCINST networks several issues have emerged, including the following:
 
1)  "Objectivity"
 
   Despite popular opinion, objectivity simply doesn't seem possible.
Emile Duclaux (a biographer of Pasteur) wrote (p. 31 in our book):
"However broad-minded one may be, he is always to some extent the slave of
his education and of his past."
 
   With five decades of indoctrination about bee language (professors,
teachers, textbooks, Nature films, etc.), can anyone view evidence counter
to that notion without some degree of bias?  For a comment on this, we can
turn to Peter Medawar (p. 228 in our book):  "It is a common failing...to
fall in love with a hypothesis and to be unwilling to take no for an
answer....There is very often no finally decisive yes, though quite often
there can be a decisive no."
 
2)  "Consensus" and "Authority"
 
   Scientists frequently invoke consensus and authority in efforts to
"resolve" controversy, as in one Internet message:  "The consensus is that
the story is true."  Consensus, as well as dismissal by authoritative
scientists (aided by misapplication of our anonymous referee system), can
easily shift opinion toward one side of a controversy.   With e-mail,
though, we have less control over expression.  (Are scientists ready for
democracy?)
 
   However, gaining the upper hand (achieving consensus) does not
necessarily resolve a controversy, because Nature pays little heed to our
theories.  Furthermore, evidence usually matters little during the heat of
a controversy.  Proponents of a hypothesis embrace one set of evidence.
Opponents focus on other evidence.
 
   If bees really had a language and that notion had  helped beekeepers
this past five decades, the controversy would have been resolved long ago.
The disparate views aired during this Internet exchange indicate quite
clearly that consensus no longer exists (if it ever really did!).
 
   Mark Twain addressed the notion of scientific consensus long ago in his
essay: "Dr. Loeb's Incredible Discovery":  "Whatever new thing a Consensus
[bets against], bet your money on that very card and do not be afraid."
 
3)  The conduct of science.
 
   Some of the "hard sciences" have a tradition in which supportive
evidence does not matter much if a hypothesis fails a real test (witness
"Cold Fusion" research).  In this recent network exchange we have read
about an "overwhelming body of supportive evidence."  That is true; one
can easily obtain evidence in support of the bee language hypothesis.   The
trouble:  there is also now an overwhelming body of negative evidence ---
as outlined in my previous post of the abstract published last month.
 
   One can neither prove a hypothesis true nor prove it false.  That is why
we did not claim in our book that we had "proved" bees do not have a
language.  By placing test stations to ascertain where recruits search in
one area of the environment but not in all other areas, one actually alters
the natural system (the Heisenberg principle of indeterminacy).  Anyone who
claims to have run an experiment and found "truth" remains on shaky ground
indeed.
 
   Predictabilty (learning what will happen under novel circumstances),
rather than repeatabilty (gathering ever more "supportive" evidence) leads
to progress in science.  For a summary of that attitude, I refer people to
our 1991 review article in the AMERICAN ZOOLOGIST (as cited in the abstract
posted earlier).
 
4)  The elusive bee language hypothesis.
 
   A honey bee dance language hypothesis no longer seems to exist.  In 1970
I searched the literature (including all of von Frisch's writings) for a
concise statement of that hypothesis but could not find one.  Accordingly,
25 years ago I published what appears to be the one and only formal
statement of that hypothesis.  Patrick Wells and I republished that
statement (p. 64 of our 1990 book).  Since that time no one has challenged
that version of the hypothesis, as far as we know.
 
   In scientific research, a clearly stated hypothesis is essential.  What
we have now on this bee language notion, however, is defense of an
ill-defined concept that no one seems willing to state concisely (or a
willingness to acknowledge that my formal statement holds).  In the past
few years I have asked several bee researchers to write down exactly what
THEY now mean by the bee language "story" but have yet to receive a reply.
 
5)  The relative weight of evidence.
 
   One point seems to have become lost:  The burden of proof for those who
wish to believe in bee "language" (a highly improbable possibility --- one
and only one insect species that can interpret and act on symbols?) falls
more heavily on proponents of that idea than on those who accept results in
conflict with that view (such as the 16 points in my distributed abstract).
 
 
********
 
   I am sorry to have gone on so long, but beekeepers might not mind ---
most of them wait longingly for spring and the chance to work once again
with their most interesting creatures.  In subsequent postings I will
elaborate on some of the above points.  In the meantime I thank Phil
Veldhuis, Allen Dick, Julian O'Dea, Steve Bambara, and Gordon Scott.  Their
comments indicate that we have anything but consensus on the issue of bee
"language."  I also thank Doug Yanega for stimulating input, as well as
Julian O'Dea and Fred Dyer for their efforts to dismiss the issue of
personalities in this matter.
 
                                                                Adrian
 
 
 
 
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