Honey bee societies display complex organization that has been compared to that of an individual organism, like us. William Morton Wheeler called insect societies, such as the honey bee, ‘superorganisms.’ He enumerated three fundamental activities in his definition, namely nutrition, reproduction and protection. We will explore this concept. Is a honey bee superorganism an entity, or just a metaphor? How did it evolve and how does it function? There is no social set of genes that can be modified by selection. Instead, the genes of the colony reside in the nuclei of cells inside thousands of individuals, each with a unique set. And how can it function without any central control system?
Course Code
509067