Peter Borst very recently quoted Tania Munz's touting of Gould's claim to
have experimentally confirmed use of DL information under v. Frisch's
conditions. This is not surprising at all. The "proof", published by James
L. Gould in *Nature* of 1974, *Science* of 1975, and *J. comp. Physiol. * of
1975, was capped by his publication in *Quart. Rev. Biol*. of 1975; where he
claimed (highly prematurely) to have finally closed the DL controversy once
and for all.
His claims have been touted by him, and by many other staunch DL practically
everywhere. And there seems no end to this. I have debunked his claims in
several articles published in refereed journals in several articles
(starting in 1978), and much more efficiently, on very many websites on the
Internet, since then.different on the Internet; to the point that I thought
I might have done so on Bee-L too. However, irrespective of whether I had,
or had not done that, I shall dismiss Gould's claims through a very short
shrift here.
His claims are based on his interpretations of data concerning distributions
of new-arrivals he obtained in various teats using small, man-made, sources
of attractive odors (made identical in every controllable aspect),
distributed at various sites in the field. His interpretations are, however,
based on his own expectations from use of odor alone all alone, that make
the interpretations totally irrelevant.to the whole DL controversy.
He assumes that when recruits use odor all along, they still use information
about the approximate site of their foragers' food-source. Except that
instead of obtaining the information from foragers'-dances, they obtain it
from the natural locale-odors the foragers carry into the hive from the
locale of their food-source.
How do they do it? They presumably identify that locale on a map of the
"olfactory landscape" over the whole foraging area of the colony, which they
stored in memory, based on previous experience in , simply because DL
opponents have always taken it for granted that honeybee-recruits use odor
alone all along to find attractive odor-sources in the field, just as flying
insects in general do it. And this includes solitary flying insects, that
have no one to provide them with any information about the approximate site
of any source of attractive odors, through dances, or through specific
natural locale-odors. Case closed!
And this is not even the worst problem Gould's claims have. But for staunch
DL supporters, any logical analysis which discredits claims for the
existence of the honeybee DL is "evil", and they will "see no evil", "hear
no evil", and "speak no evil". They have simply closed their minds, beyond
the point of no return!
Sincerely,
Ruth Rosin ("Prickly pear")
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