The bee rapture and other idiocy considering CCD
Posted on: May 3, 2007 - 10:05am
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The bee rapture and other idiocy considering CCD
Not sure how many of you have heard of CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder - or the die-off of honeybees recently.) Anyway it has spawned tons of irrational explanations - from the at least plausible (cell phones cause it) to the idiotic (God made a rapture for bees) to jokes (they are making crop circles.) And of course the Einstein quote that he never actually made (that if honeybees die, humans will become extinct in 4 years.) Like to hear comments.
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I'm actually curious to hear what people think of this. The latest I heard is that if any more bees die off we're going to have a food crisis. Why I imagine that there is truth to that, I feel like the news media has once again tried to scare the crap out of us by using terrifying headlines. I understand that this sort of thing has happened before but scientists are scratching their heads as to the cause of it.
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The latest I've heard is due to some kind of fungus which has spread due to the weird weather we're having. That's the believed cause in Europe apparently and they're now looking for signs of this or something similar in America.
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A few deaths in general wouldn't mean much, but this is a very bad global situation. 4 years is a nonsensical suggestion, but it does still have some very real economic and social consequences. Agriculture will be very hard hit. And a significant number of beekeepers will be going out of business. Some farmers have lost up to 90% of their bees. Replacing them is logistically impossible when almost every farmer has the same problem.
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The cell phone thing is a crock, I don't know why that has even persisted. Probably the most probable is the bees being affected by pesticides on the plants they pollinate. Organic honey farmers have not experienced a loss of bee colonies.
That has been considered.
The top suspects are a parasite, an unknown virus, some kind of bacteria, pesticides, or a one-two combination of the top four, with one weakening the honeybee and the second killing it.
A quick experiment with some of the devastated hives makes pesticides seem less likely. In the recent experiment, Mr. Pettis and colleagues irradiated some hard-hit hives and reintroduced new bee colonies. More bees thrived in the irradiated hives than in the non-irradiated ones, pointing toward some kind of disease or parasite that was killed by radiation.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
Yeah I kinda agree the 4 years seems a little over the top but from what I read 25% of what we eat is directly or indirectly related to honey bees. That is a huge %.
If food production was to be cut by 25% food prices would rise more than 25%. I guess the range of $ would go up from 33% to 50% in the US and many times more in non industrialized nations.
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