Logic Collapse Disorder

Logic Collapse Disorder

I couldn’t agree more with Hannah Grimm. I’ve had people link to the Harvard study as “proof” that neonicotinoids are the cause of colony collapse disorder in my previous post, where it is discussed in more detail:

Honey bee boo boo?

https://plus.google.com/u/0/+ChadHaney/posts/1tfmy49UCjN

h/t Gnotic Pasta and Kee Hinckley 

#ScienceEveryday  

Originally shared by Hannah Grimm

*Bad Science: pushing your agenda instead of looking for real causes*

There’s been a lot of talk recently about Colony Collapse Disorder, the mysterious disappearances of bees from their hives, a serious problem that threatens American food production.  There’s a number of suspects: Varroa mites, which spread disease; monocultures, which lead to a lack of food when your lone crop isn’t in bloom; and pesticides, which (obviously) kill insects.  A particular type of insecticide, the neonicotinoids, have recently fallen under suspicion after a Harvard researcher published a study in which bees fed syrup laced with the pesticide died.

Just one problem: he fed the bees a concentration of poison hundreds of times what they’d experience in the real world.  The study is the equivalent of injecting people with pure mercury and then claiming that tuna fish sandwiches, with their trace amounts of the toxin, are killing us.  It’s like lacing your test subject’s food with Arsenic and then claiming that apples are bad for you because you might swallow the occasional seed!

This kind of bad science isn’t harmless.  It takes attention away from actual solutions.  At the end of the day, it’s a lot easier to feel smug and buy your organic, pesticide-free produce than it is to ask whether that organic farmer is monoculturing or not.  What happens when your heirloom tomatoes aren’t in bloom?  What will the bees eat then?  Odds are, CCD is just caused by starvation caused by all of the nearby plants blooming simultaneously.  Preserving habitat, planting wildflowers or having different crops are hard solutions, but they’re the ones that might actual save the bees.  

It’s time we stop feeling smug about our pesticide usage and ask what’s really killing the bees.

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-05-14/bad-science-doesn-t-help-bees