Scientists Solve the Riddle of Bumblebee Flight

Hey, What's a bumblee? Hee Hee

Opps..Sorry. It's corrected.

Hey Chris, just kidding.Love the site.Ive stopped watching TV. Hope I did'nt bee you off with the bumblee shot. No ill intent.

Grant,

Thank you very much for your kind words about the site. I took no offense at all in your pointing out my mistake.

- Chris

I read somewhere that bees create 'double lift' by creating lift on both the downstroke, and upstroke cycles of their wingbeats. Can't remember the exact details....can anyone else?

I remember reading or hearing something about some guys doing experiments with small flying insects. The conclusion of this (if I remember correctly) was that at that small of a scale, the air is relatively viscous and that this viscosity results more in the small insects "swimming" in the air rather than "flying." Does anyone recall hearing anything about this? It seems logical. Anytime you take something to the fringes the rules need to be tweaked a little.

Yes I remember hearing that somwhere. Supposedly that was also why their bodies are all covered in hair. It increases their surface area which makes them "float" better.

http://www.physicstoday.org/pt/vol-53/iss-12/p22.h tml Interesting link about insect flight

It's pretty lame when ID's proponents have to make an argument that says something like "Since science don't know everything, it must not be right (w.r.t. evolution)". Could you imagine how boring it would be if we suddenly knew the answers to *every* question? Where's the mystery in that? (I guess one way to know the answer to every question is to never think of a new question...)

The scientific process is not about being right, it's about being more right that we were, until proved wrong, and being open to being proved wrong. It is a form of faith (in the process), if you care to think of it that way.

I read an article recently in the RPI alumni magazine that talked the question "Do you believe in the Big Bang?". (The question was asked by a young relative, and the article was a thoughtful response.) My take on the author's position was that in science, you don't "believe" in a theory, as much as you accept that it explains much of the observable data. When confronted with unexplainable data, you allow for the theory to be incomplete, and when a better theory is proposed (and tested), you move on.

Anyway, I bet those researchers are having a lot of fun trying figure our the simple mystery of a bumble bee's flight.