In Adrian's first comment: " I won't pretend to be able to answer all that was asked but can provide some insight. " and "However, I cannot comment about the correspondence between the poison sacs of stingers and where they might have come from." And in the second response, Adrian quoted from other sources who were only able to compare/contrast the stinger - first "An ovipositor develops in the same way as does the sting, and works in much the same manner, but the mechanism necessary for discharging eggs is in general simpler than that for injecting poison...." Again, noting similarities, not saying there is evolutionary relationship. note again, "The sting of the bee is similar in its structure and mechanism to an egg-laying organ, known as the ovipositor, possessed by many other female insects . . ." " . . .but in such cases its function is merely to form a hole in which the eggs may be deposited. " - "Is similar" "but" - different. The clincher? "The sting of the stinging Hymenoptera (Plate 20), therefore, is very evidently an ovipositor that has been remodeled in a few ways for the injection of poison instead of eggs." "Instead, scientists have to attend to hypotheses about HOW and WHAT." Here again, I said, In fact, nobody has seen the 'evolution' and we can only hypothesize about what 'might' have happened. With all due respect, Adrian, you support my original statements very well. My point is, among the many theories of evolution, we must remember that the science of origins is purely hypothetical, based on interpretation of the facts at hand and pre-suppositions of a begining point, and presuppositions about the interval from that beginning and the present. This interval would have been unattended by today's scientists - who come up with different interpretation(sometimes wildly different) of the same facts. Nobody on earth today saw it happen - if it did happen by evolution. One of my science professors said frequently "Correlation does not imply causality." As students, we would sometimes imitate his monotone restatement of this; however, in reality, this statement has been demonstrated frequently. Our world is far to complex to say "These two things have similarities, therefore they must have the same original purpose." And I think that scientists are also very concerned with WHY in many cases, I know that medical scientists are, as WHY leads to important cures. A complete understanding of science needs to include WHY. Original purpose is definitely theological; furthermore the WHY of PURPOSE must remain in the realm of theology. Tim Rich, bee-keeper for my sons' bees.