Scientists Breeding Super Bees 248
Elliot Chang writes "Over the last five years the world's honey bee population has been steadily dwindling, with many beekeepers citing 2010 as the worst year yet. In order to save these extremely important insects, scientists are working on breeding a new super honey bee that they hope will be resistant to cold, disease, mites and pesticides. If all goes well, the new and improved insect will continue to pollinate our crops for years to come."
Re:Awesome. (Score:4, Informative)
I couldn't think of a good response to this. I guess I'll have to wing it.
Re:What's the problem? (Score:4, Informative)
There is a fair bit of info on the wikipedia page for Colony Collapse Disorder...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder [wikipedia.org]
The widely-cited "90%" is wrong. (Score:5, Informative)
The widely-quoted "90% of the world's crops depend on bees" is simply wrong.
The vast majority of the world's caloric intake comes from grains, legumes, and tubers, the vast majority of which require do not bee pollination.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_crop_plants_pollinated_by_bees [wikipedia.org]
Re:They tried this already. (Score:5, Informative)
Thinking that nature thinks, and that if it does it cares at all about our survival, is pretty much the stupidest thing I can imagine.
Nature doesn't give a shit about us, or about anything. It just is - and if, in the process of nature taking its course, humanity is wiped out in the most horrific way possible, then nature doesn't care at all.
So yes, we can know better than nature - because nature doesn't know anything at all.
Stop using pesticides (Score:2, Informative)
Hmm. Maybe if you stop spraying all that shit on out food we (and the bees) wouldn't be in such a mess.