The Dearest Bee Waggle Trip The Low-Cal Fantastic - Is It A Language?
Sunday, July 31, 2016
The Dance
More than one-half a century ago, Karl von Frisch rocked the basis of behavioral biological scientific discipline amongst his determination that the honeybees (Apis mellifera) tin genuinely communicate the distance to too management of valuable nutrient sources through an elaborate “waggle dance.” In what afterwards led to his receipt of the Nobel Prize inwards Physiology or Medicine, von Frisch determined that bees recruited past times this trip the lite fantastic used the information encoded inwards it to guide them straight to the remote location of the resource.
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| Bee dance |
In the typical waggle dance, a foraging worker bee who has institute past times a rich nutrient beginning returns to the hive, is greeted past times other bees, too commences dancing on the vertical comb surface inside the night nest (in other species of bee, like Apis florea, the trip the lite fantastic is performed on a horizontal surface inwards direct persuasion of the Sun and/or other landmarks). She dances inwards a figure-eight pattern, alternating “waggle runs,” during which she vigorously waggles her trunk from side to side inwards a pendulum displace at almost xiii times per minute every bit she moves forrad inwards a straight line, amongst furnish phases inwards which she circles dorsum to the approximate starting dot of the previous waggle run, alternatingly betwixt clockwise too counter-clockwise returns. Here’s a video of a bee doing the waggle dance:
As the video indicates, the honeybee’s trip the lite fantastic encodes cardinal information almost the resource. For instance, every bit she performs waggle runs on the vertical comb surface, her average trunk angle amongst abide by to gravity corresponds to the management of the nutrient beginning relative to the electrical flow seat of the Sun (the sun’s azimuth).
Accordingly, if the nutrient beginning lies inwards the exact management of the sun, she volition waggle straight upwards; if the nutrient lies, say, xxx degrees to the correct of the imaginary describe to the sun, she volition angle upwards xxx degrees to the correct of vertical. Also, the duration of her waggling runs is straight linked to the flying distance from the hive to the nutrient source, amongst (for many bee subspecies) every extra 75 milliseconds of waggling adding roughly some other 100 meters to the distance. Further, the to a greater extent than attractive the destination, the longer too to a greater extent than vigorously she dances, too the to a greater extent than speedily she returns for the start of each waggle run. Depending on the richness of the nutrient source, she may perform upward to 100 waggle runs inwards a unmarried dance.
Accordingly, if the nutrient beginning lies inwards the exact management of the sun, she volition waggle straight upwards; if the nutrient lies, say, xxx degrees to the correct of the imaginary describe to the sun, she volition angle upwards xxx degrees to the correct of vertical. Also, the duration of her waggling runs is straight linked to the flying distance from the hive to the nutrient source, amongst (for many bee subspecies) every extra 75 milliseconds of waggling adding roughly some other 100 meters to the distance. Further, the to a greater extent than attractive the destination, the longer too to a greater extent than vigorously she dances, too the to a greater extent than speedily she returns for the start of each waggle run. Depending on the richness of the nutrient source, she may perform upward to 100 waggle runs inwards a unmarried dance.
Cognitive Complexity
It seems, then, that honeybees conduct maintain evolved an extraordinary complex cast of symbolic communication almost distant resources, i that is beyond the capabilities of virtually every other species except for humans. Not bad for an insect.
The cognitive tasks implicated past times the waggle trip the lite fantastic are non insignificant: the dancer must retrieve the location too characteristics of a specific site she has seen on her foraging trips, too interpret this information into the appropriate trip the lite fantastic characteristics. She must also retrieve too conduct maintain into describe of piece of job concern human relationship the seat of the sun, too update that seat every bit the Sun moves (the might to compensate for the sun’s create past times retentivity has been documented past times researchers observing dances over several hours of overcast weather, when at that topographic point are no celestial cues to move seen). The observing bees must “read” the dance, interpret their sensory input into a resources location, too and hence observe the resource, navigating every bit necessary approximately hills, houses too other obstacles.
In fact, the feat is hence stunning that von Frisch’s findings were initially met amongst important skepticism too controversy.1 At this point, the tilt has essentially been settled, amongst scientists recognizing that at that topographic point is compelling evidence that honeybees genuinely exercise communicate too deed on the information encoded inwards the waggle dance, fifty-fifty though doubtfulness remains regarding just which signals (tactile, odor, vibrations, air flows, etc.) the observing bees utilization to interpret the trip the lite fantastic into actionable information regarding the resources location.2
Is the Waggle Dance a “Language”?
So, the waggle trip the lite fantastic is an extremely complex communication system, but is it a language?
Eileen Crist, Associate Professor inwards Science too Technology inwards Society at Virginia Tech, makes a rather compelling instance that the waggle trip the lite fantastic embodies many of the attributes of a truthful language.3 After noting that the waggle trip the lite fantastic is ever performed inwards front end of an audience too is clearly communicative inwards nature, she describes some of the principal features that back upward its beingness characterized every bit a language:
1. Rule-Governed. If a communication organization is to move considered linguistic inwards nature, it mostly must move based on a laid of rules that are structured too used amongst regularity. This is the instance amongst the waggle dance: the trip the lite fantastic is ever performed inwards a designated house inside the hive, it is never done unless an audience is present, too it ever follows a measure template for conveying direction, distance, too desirability. While the full general dominion is that the waggle trip the lite fantastic is to move used to inform other bees almost sources of nectar, when the colony has a special requirement (e.g., locating H2O when the hive is overheating or finding a novel domicile when business office of the colony must relocate) too hence the rules dictate that the trip the lite fantastic operate switches to this pressing need. Also, the full general dominion is that foragers trip the lite fantastic almost rich, reliable too close resources, but inwards times of demand the “dance threshold” for less desirable resources is lowered.
2. Complexity. A cardinal dimension of a truthful linguistic communication is its complexity, every bit it is unlikely that a communication organization based on simply a few rules volition qualify every bit a language. The bee trip the lite fantastic rules are non exclusively extremely intricate, but they are applied inwards a versatile too complex fashion to answer to differing environmental factors too hive requirements.
3. Stability too Dynamism. A gist characteristic of human linguistic communication is that a relatively fixed too stable syntax enables the dynamic generation of an indefinite number of novel sentences. Similarly, spell the waggle trip the lite fantastic ever takes the same recognizable forms, it “accommodates different purposes, shifting circumstances, urgent needs, too unprecedented events; spell structurally identical every time, it is also contextually flexible.”
4. Symbolic. By itself, the symbolic nature of the waggle trip the lite fantastic has led to its beingness called a language. The trip the lite fantastic symbolically represents conditions existing inwards the existent world, genuinely enabling human researchers to “read” the information encoded inwards the trip the lite fantastic to observe specific honeybee nutrient sources too fifty-fifty to blueprint experiments almost honeybee foraging behavior.
5. Performative. According to linguistic theory too every bit commencement articulated past times John Austin, languages non exclusively depict the world, they also include what he called “performative” utterances, which are used to deport out actions.4 Not exclusively is the waggle trip the lite fantastic symbolically descriptive, but it has performative forcefulness inwards the sense that it elicits activity from the bees who sentinel it (as Crist notes, the performative nature of the waggle trip the lite fantastic is implicit inwards the means inwards which scientists “routinely deploy a vocabulary of announcing, reporting, summoning, recruiting, soliciting, inviting, commanding, too guiding” inwards describing it).
James Gould, Professor of Ecology too Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University, summarized both the tilt over the number too the nature of honeybee trip the lite fantastic communication every bit follows:
Some of the resistance to the thought that beloved bees receive a symbolic linguistic communication seems to conduct maintain arisen from a conviction that “lower” animals, too insects inwards particular, are also small-scale too phylogenetically remote to move capable of “complex” behavior. There is possibly a feeling of incongruity inwards that the beloved bee linguistic communication is symbolic too abstract, and, inwards damage of information capacity at least, minute exclusively to human language.5
Gould estimates that the waggle trip the lite fantastic is capable of communicating at to the lowest degree xl meg unique messages (“sentences”), to a greater extent than than 10 times every bit many every bit whatever other brute except for man.6
Not surprisingly, non everyone agrees that the waggle trip the lite fantastic constitutes a truthful language. For example, Stephen Anderson, Professor of Linguistics at Yale University, acknowledges that honeybee trip the lite fantastic communication is elaborate too cognitively rich, but concludes that it is dissimilar human natural linguistic communication inwards that, for example, it is genetically fixed rather than learned through environmental interactions, it lacks a syntax inwards which the social club of the communicative elements (words or actions) impacts meaning, too at that topographic point is a unopen correspondence betwixt the construction of the trip the lite fantastic signals too the nature information to move conveyed (e.g., orientation of the waggle run too the management to the resource).7
Some bees are improve at the trip the lite fantastic than others...
To Bee or Not to Bee
In the end, at that topographic point volition in all likelihood ever move fighting too disagreement over whether the waggle trip the lite fantastic is a truthful language. Clearly, the waggle trip the lite fantastic too human linguistic communication are vastly different communication systems, too how nosotros label the waggle trip the lite fantastic inwards human damage may move missing the point. From the honeybee standpoint, the trip the lite fantastic serves its purposes too contains all of the communicative nuances that the bees demand inside their environment. Maybe, the existent dot is that nosotros should sit down dorsum too appreciate the fact that the honeybee, a small-scale insect amongst tiny brain, has been able to evolve a organization of communications that is hence sophisticated that it has challenged human linguists to wrestle amongst the query of what distinguishes a truthful linguistic communication too whether human linguistic communication is genuinely hence unique.
Anyhow, fourth dimension to halt droning on too sign off!
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1See, e.g., Gould, J. (1975). Honey bee recruitment: the dance-language controversy Science, 189 (4204), 685-693 DOI: 10.1126/science.1154023.
2See, e.g., Landgraf, T., Rojas, R., Nguyen, H., Kriegel, F., & Stettin, K. (2011). Analysis of the Waggle Dance Motion of Honeybees for the Design of a Biomimetic Honeybee Robot PLoS ONE, 6 (8) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0021354; Gil, M., & De Marco, R. (2010). Decoding information inwards the honeybee dance: revisiting the tactile hypothesis Animal Behaviour, 80 (5), 887-894 DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2010.08.012.
3Crist, E. (2004). Can an Insect Speak?: The Case of the Honeybee Dance Language Social Studies of Science, 34 (1), 7-43 DOI: 10.1177/0306312704040611.
4Hymes, D. (1965). : How to Do Things amongst Words . John L. Austin. American Anthropologist, 67 (2), 587-588 DOI: 10.1525/aa.1965.67.2.02a00970.
5Gould, J. L. Ibid. at 692.
6Gould, J. L. Ibid. at banking concern complaint 37.
7Anderson, S. R. 2004. Doctor Dolittle’s delusion: Animals too the uniqueness of human language. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press. ISBN-13: 978-0300115253.