A recent article in the Scientific American introduced the notion that Bees and other invertebrates may have some type of a emotional response system. The study also provides some evidence that their response to specific stimuli when under duress may become more pessimistic than when in a normal non agitated state.I have always believe that all life is sacred and needs to be considered when living this life. As a quote from the articles points out:
"To put it another way, our criteria for assessing animal emotions should be blind to whether the animal has fur, feathers or an exoskeleton. Either bees and other invertebrates get a trial membership in the club of the genuinely anxious, or we must concede that our beloved pets’ seemingly pessimistic actions imply nothing about their feelings. For a smitten dog owner, at least, the choice is probably obvious."
This really provides food for thought. Do you think perhaps the problems with the honeybees could be related to burnout? Or perhaps depression? A couple of weeks ago there was a news article circulating about scientists at the U of C finding evidence of consistent, species specific altruism in rats.
ReplyDeleteI believe it may be all the above ... if stress is a factor, then they may be able reach a level of "burnout" that brings on a form of depression which tells the insect to just "give up" ...
DeleteI believe that all life forms, including plants, have a "nervous" systems of sorts. Remember the experiment with scientist playing music to plants? The plants that had music played grew larger and stronger than the ones that didn't get music. It did appear that they liked classical over rock though :)
ReplyDeleteIt could be possible the bee's immunity systems have become "weakened" from stress of some sort, maybe climate change. Except for a couple of mite infestations, it seems they don't know for sure what is diminishing the bee population, but I would bet that what ever it is it effects the bee's ability to function without stress on it "nervous" system.