BEES CAN DO MATH

According to a new study published in Science Advances, a team of researchers from Australia and France have shown that bees can perform simple arithmetic, adding and subtracting small numbers by studying color-coded shapes. The team used a three-chambered maze shaped like a Y, training bees to enter through a hole into a small chamber where they would see blue or yellow shapes on a plain, grey background. The number of shapes varied between 1 and 5 and the color of the shapes told the bee whether it needed to add one (blue) or subtract one (yellow) from the initial number. The bee then flew into a subsequent chamber which presented both a correct option and an incorrect option. If they got the answer correct, the bee was rewarded with a drop of tasty sugar solution. If wrong, they would get a drop of quinine, which tastes horrible to a bee. The bees performed better than random chance, which would be selecting the correct answer 50 percent of the time – they selected the correct answer around 65 percent of the time. The finding suggests that the honeybees miniature brain can, at the very least, use symbols to add and subtract numbers.
* Bees also multiply pretty good.
* The first math problem that was given to the bees was this: A research bee stings the scientist, and the scientist smashes it. How many research bees are left?
* It sounds dumb to us, but the entomology world is really buzzing about it.
* Math bees, sure, why not? We’ve already got spelling bees.
* I give this bee study a D-minus.