Mind of a Bee

English language

Published Dec. 20, 2022 by Princeton University Press.

ISBN:
978-0-691-18047-2
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5 stars (8 reviews)

2 editions

An Incredible, Thought-Provoking Look at Bee Cognition

5 stars

Lars Chittka has penned a masterpiece, using witty writing with fascinating narratives around the genesis of different experiments to lay out a solid case for bees as capable of far more cognition than most people think. Starting from an exploration of bee sensory mechanisms (the sections on navigation and light polarization were amazing), then moving to a wide variety of experiments to detail just how much bees can plan, remember, and reason. Some of the sections on group behavior was less compelling, since while Chittka briefly explores complexity theory it wasn't touched on in the section on hive construction.

Overall this is one of the best books on cognition that I've read, and with all the hype about "general intelligence" folks would be well advised to pick up a copy of this book before opining on the topic. Highly recommend

Review of 'Mind of a Bee' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

It's great! Most of the book is great stuff that I was expecting: experiments and findings about bees. What I did not expect is the biographical bits about historical bee researchers. These are very short, so absolutely don't distract from the bee content. But they are also amazing! Never a boring figure. Everybody was a freed slave, fighting the nazis, ending up in an insane asylum, or something else equally gripping.

The bee content is focused on the individual bee and does a good job of reining in the "hivemind" myth a bit. My only issue with the bee content is that it assumed more bee knowledge of me than what I have. On the first pages it explains that bee hives are pitch dark and crazy crowded. That bees only live a few weeks and collect only around 1 gram of honey over their lives. That's amazing and I …

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