On Feb 25, 2006, at 3:48 PM, Gavin Ramsay wrote (in small part):
> Wow! That [Riley et al.] paper happens to be sitting on my desktop,
> and I'll happily share
> my thoughts on it with you all. First of all, a little background.
>
> I'm a scientist, a crop scientist. Trained (and reasonably successful
> as
> far as I know) in being objective and perceptive. As a regular journal
> reviewer I'm used to reassessing the interpretation scientific authors
> put
> on their results. The paper Ruth just criticised *is* science of the
> highest quality. I find it most impressive.
In response, I too am a scientist — a bee scientist for half a
century and natural historian in general, with considerable experience
in commercial beekeeping. I have also studied the Riley et al.
publication on "radar tracking of bees" that has caused such a stir.
However, I came up with quite a different assessment than Gavin Ramsey
and Jim Fischer and noticed the absence of some essential controls.
Most puzzling: can one capture a bee as it is about to leave the
hive, glue on a transponder, and then believe that such bee will behave
as if nothing had happened? The beekeepers I know don't believe so,
and I respect their conclusions.
One can see my analysis at:
http://www.beesource.com/pov/wenner/radar.htm
The radar tracking scientists strove to prove their hypothesis true
— a most unfortunate experimental approach in the world of science
(though such an approach can sometimes yield important results in
fields such as physics).
Also, both Gavin and Jim surely know that one should not accept
results and conclusions from an experiment until some other group has
independently replicated the experiment, preferably with tighter
controls. Let me provide one example of too ready an acceptance of a
study.
I studied James Gould's doctoral dissertation and read in one
section that he conducted 33 half-hour "misdirection" experiments one
summer. In 1974 he published the results from only three of those 33
one-half hour experiments as a "letter" in the journal Nature
(252:300-301). However, not even his dissertation includes the results
of the other 30 half-hour experiments. Was this a case of
"cherry-picking" the evidence?
Gould's results were eagerly embraced by those within the bee
language belief system, but no one has repeated his experiments and
gained similar results — though some have tried (as they have told me).
Other researchers I know consider much of Gould's work now
discredited.
I have a written analysis of the above assertion about Gould's
experiments that I can mail to anyone interested.
We are all "prisoners of our past," as one of the Pasteur
biographers wrote. That is, we view evidence from the perspective of
our own indoctrination from earlier years. For the past several
decades, the bee language story has appeared everywhere: in nature
programs on television, in textbooks at all levels in our schools, etc.
Little wonder, then, that such a dogma has become part of our culture.
Any evidence in support of such a belief system becomes eagerly
grasped, with counter evidence readily dismissed. As Steve Jobs
phrased it last year, "Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with
the results of other people's thinking."
As I stated earlier on this network, I do not consider that the bee
language controversy is about evidence. We all have access to the same
evidence but view it from different perspectives according to our prior
indoctrination (or lack thereof).
Those subscribers new to BEE-L can learn of my long term involvement
in the controversy at:
http://www.beesource.com/pov/wenner/index.htm
Those who read that account will learn that I was the one who
discovered the waggle dance sounds and conducted my doctoral research
on the assumption that the bee language story was true. Later, the
behavior of the bees themselves indicated to my co-workers and myself
that von Frisch's earlier odor-search hypothesis made far more sense.
One can now find most of our publications on the matter at
BeeSource.com (Point of View).
Millions of dollars have now been spent repeatedly trying to prove
that bee "language" is real, despite earlier claims by researchers that
they have already "proven" the hypothesis true. Wouldn't all that
expenditure of time and money be better spent on real problems that
beekeepers face every day? Does the performance of only three dozen
radar tracked bees finally resolve a controversy that has been with us
for four decades already? And what about the vast amount of evidence
that doesn't fit with the conclusions of Riley and co-workers?
Finally, there is a logical dilemma. During the last 35 years we
have been treated to several "conclusive" experiments that point to bee
language. Only after someone comes up with yet another "conclusive"
experiment do advocates admit that earlier experiments had not "proven"
language among bees after all. In a few years I predict that the
radar-tracking experiments will also be discarded.
Nowadays, I find that most beekeepers I talk with at meetings care
very little about the controversy. They have varroa and tracheal
mites, small hive beetles, AHB, AFB, dwindling colony strength, low
honey prices, and (now) the need for pollination contracts in writing.
The bee language hypothesis has not helped them one wit!
Adrian
Adrian M. Wenner (805) 963-8508 (home office phone)
967 Garcia Road [log in to unmask]
Santa Barbara, CA 93103 www.beesource.com/pov/wenner/index.htm
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"For what a man more likes to be true, he more readily believes."
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
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