Agriculture Is Killing Way More Bees Than We Realized, Huge Study Reveals

I don't know if it is pesticides that kill bees but face it.... cide ....means to kill.

 

And those are surveys, not experiments.

An example is a survey which asks a number of questions, including what is your weight and do you have a TV in your bedroom.

Lather, Rinse, Repeat for any number of similar surveys conducted over any given time that include data related to weight and number of TVs or where those TVs are located.

Someone then conducts a study reviewing those surveys and says, "TVs in the bedroom cause obesity in children."

Or someone might say, "Link found between obesity and children with TVs in their bedroom."

Correlation is not causation and causation cannot be proven without an experiment.

Why? Because some children with TVs in their bedroom might live in urban areas while others live in rural areas and the children in rural areas are not so obese. The TV is not the cause, but lack of ample space to play and act like children could be the cause, but you won't know that until you conduct an experiment to control for such factors.

Yes, I know.

That's because not only have you never conducted an experiment ever in your life, you have never conducted a study, either, and so you know nothing of methodology, which is critical to both experiments and studies, because if the methodology for the experiment or the study is unsound or even unethical, then the experiment or the study are flawed.

Another example of flawed methodologies in studies are those on the "gender pay gap."

Their flawed methodology is just to go to the Census Bureau and pull data and then claim there's a pay gap while ignoring relevant factors.

Yes, he has an MBA and she has an MBA and he gets $100,000 while she gets $40,000 but that is not proof of a gender pay gap.

The morons who authored the study forgot to tell you he has 20 years experience, while she got her MBA then married and raised a family and has just gotten hired as an MBA for the first time, so she has no experience and she is getting paid what he got paid when he first started.

And, when their not lying about that, they disingenuously look at salary only, rather than total compensation or duties required.

He's got an MBA and just starting and getting $90,000 while she's the same but getting only $75,000.

Unfair? Nope. The idiot authors forgot to tell you that he is expected to travel weekly to manage offices in his much larger territory, while she negotiated a lower salary rate because she has a smaller territory and never has to travel, so she can have quality time with her children.

Reputable scientific sources, plus persons educated, trained and experienced in managing bee hives are emphatic that parasites, bacterial and viral diseases, as well as single-crop farming are the causes.

 

More of an issue for commercial fruit growers, you mean our food supply?

Not very comforting.

 

"Correlation is not causation' , an oft used quip, is not actually quite right.

Wouldn't a more accurate statement be something like:

"Correlation may, or may not be, causation, or may, or may not point to causation, but a good detective starts looking there". ?

 

A number of years ago I read about a college professor involved in this issue. He noted that the bees subject to suspected harmful agricultural practices (including reliance on biocides) were not busy when the temperature decreased towards their low tolerance level. But he had some hives up in the mountains that were not subject to toxic agrichem use. At that same temperature his bees were still busy.

Yet the chemical producers can claim that there's been no proof that the chemicals are what's disabling the bees. The implication is obvious, but the pundits insist that the issue has to be studied thoroughly before any action is taken to reduce the use of chemicals. Yeah, study it to death despite what's obvious but inconvenient and adverse to somebody's bottom line.

 

To be fair...it's a huge bottom line! There are some 900 million acres of farmland in the US.

For those who think the 'bottom line' is most important, if there were alternative methods to various pesticides, and if they cost the same or less, it's logical to believe farmers would move to those cheaper alternatives. And what we don't know is the efficacy of alternatives to pesticides? What is the actual increased costs and will the consumer pay the higher prices?

Ironically, the consumer will purchase and eat products grown with pesticides because they can't see the pesticides. But if the consumer sees bugs crawling in their lettuce, because non-pesticide farming is not as efficient, they won't buy the products. The commercial growers must deal with this reality...

 

the ones that spend the most researching other reasons, probably the culprits - just based on history of these type of things

they do this so they can say.. maybe it's these things, that confuses the issue

especially when huge profits involved