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Do Honeybees Defy Dinosaur Extinction Theories?

neutron_p writes "The humble tropical honeybee may challenge the idea that a post-asteroid impact "nuclear winter" was a big player in the decimation of dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Somehow the tropical honeybee, Cretotrigona prisca, survived the end-Cretaceous extinction event, despite what many researchers believe was a years-long period of darkness and frigid temperatures caused by sunlight-blocking dust and smoke from the asteroid impact at Chicxulub."

52 of 521 comments (clear)

  1. Anyone else besides me? by tekiegreg · · Score: 4, Funny

    Read that as "from the asteroid impact at Chix Club?" For a second I thought a hot nightclub got wiped off the planet and my chances of procreating in this world went down a notch or something...*phew*

    --
    ...in bed
    1. Re:Anyone else besides me? by Mr.+Bad+Example · · Score: 4, Funny

      > the asteroid impact at Chicxulub

      Sorry, Scrabble players...it's a proper noun.

    2. Re:Anyone else besides me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Your chances of procreating went down a notch when you put "slashdot.org" into your browser.

    3. Re:Anyone else besides me? by Maow · · Score: 2, Funny
      Sex != procreation.

      I don't think too many guys go to clubs with the goal of getting a woman pregnant :-)

      Your point may be valid, but I'm afraid it's wasted, since it was posted on slashdot where knowledge of the subject is purely theoretical.

      [ducks [and runs] ]

      rb
    4. Re:Anyone else besides me? by cfuse · · Score: 2, Funny
      Sex != procreation. I don't think too many guys go to clubs with the goal of getting a woman pregnant :-)

      And that, is of course why beer evolved. Natural selection causes drunk men to get together with drunk women and make offspring that are predisposed to do the same thing as soon as they can get fake id. The beer has a symbotic relationship with the human species (specifically, the drunk humper sub-species) and is perfectly adapted to it's environmental niche.

  2. ahem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    here in america, we pronounce it "nuculer", you insensitive clod.

    1. Re:ahem by back_pages · · Score: 2, Funny
      I heard an anecdote from some retired military officer (cannot possibly recall who) and he said, "Yeah, I know the difference. When I'm talking about power plants and research, I say nuclear. When I'm talking about weapons, I say nukuler. I figure, when you actually have nukuler weapons at your disposal, you can pronounce it however you damn well please."

      Can anybody put a name to that paraphrased quote?

  3. Science schmience... by rackhamh · · Score: 5, Funny

    The honeybees only survived because the aliens took them off the planet during the extinction, then brought them back about the time they built the pyramids.

    1. Re:Science schmience... by Xshare · · Score: 4, Funny

      Was this before or after the stargate was buried?

    2. Re:Science schmience... by wdavies · · Score: 2, Funny

      Well it finally explains the Honey Bees in the X-Files...

  4. Simple explanation by MoxCamel · · Score: 4, Funny

    Honey bees are do-bees. Dinosaurs are don't-bees.

  5. I love bees by AtariAmarok · · Score: 4, Funny

    I love bees.. Not only do they survive nuclear winter, but unlike cockroaches they wear cool rugby shirts. Sting on, my buzzy cousins! Sting on!

    --
    Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
    1. Re:I Love Bees by stratjakt · · Score: 2, Funny

      Now I just going to sneak up on this lil rippa, and jam me thumb up his butthole!

      Oi crikey! That's really pissing him off!

      --
      I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
  6. evil christians by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    this can only be the work of the christians that want to debun evolution, I say kill all christians, kill them all.

  7. Re:Optimal temperature range by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Maybe they lived on honey for a few years. Perhaps they had really giant honeycombs where they lived in like a nuclear fallout shelter kind of way until the bad air went away.

    It was just a thought

  8. Honeybees, huh... by demonbug · · Score: 5, Funny

    Okay already, I'll go buy Halo 2...

    Uh, this is about Halo, right?

  9. Not only that by The-Bus · · Score: 5, Funny

    My favorite bees are the ones's from Margaret's Honey in Napa, CA. I bought a case of them last month and they keep transmitting me secret messages from space, I think. I tried to decode their message, and I think it's:
    PURC HASEHA LOTWOFO RT HEXBO X
    I think the language is Sumerian, possibly. No idea, help me out here.
    I'll get to the bottom of this somehow...

    --

    Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.

    1. Re:Not only that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Are you sure it doesn't read:

      BE SURE TO DRINK YOUR OVALTINE

      That's what I got from my secret decoder ring!

  10. Its pretty obvious then by Timesprout · · Score: 4, Funny

    The bees at some point turned into swarms of ravenous dinosaur eating killers and wiped the poor innocent helpless dinos out. There can be no other explanation.

    --
    Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
    What truth?
    There is no dupe
  11. They don't really care by wombatmobile · · Score: 4, Funny

    Do Honey Bees Defy Dinasour Extinction Theories?

    Honey bees mostly don't care. Dinasour extinction theories are not getting a lot of buzz with them.

  12. Re:What I want to know is... by The+Clockwork+Troll · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's hard to tell from your post - is it possible that you are actually a flower?

    --

    There are no karma whores, only moderation johns
  13. Duh! by zmollusc · · Score: 1, Funny

    Bees are always busy. Busy bees. Hence they kept warm by working hard.
    And by being all fuzzy.

    --
    They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
  14. Freezer by spoonist · · Score: 5, Funny

    Obviously these so-called "scientists" have never caught bees in a jar then stuck them in the freezer.

    Man are they pissed when they thaw.

    Ice age. Big deal.

  15. Re:Confusion... by downward+dog · · Score: 5, Funny

    From the article:

    Late Cretaceous tropical honeybees preserved in amber are almost identical to their modern relatives, she says. If no modern tropical honeybee could have survived years in the dark and cold without the flowering plants they lived off of, Kozisek reasoned, something must be amiss with the nuclear winter theory.

    The argument is not necessarily that the event directly killed honeybees (although the article also talks about honeybees' limited tolerance for cold temperatures). Basically, the idea is that flowering plants could not have survived through the event. Without flowering plants, bees would no longer have a purpose to their existence and would be plunged into a state of desperate ennui. No, wait, I mean they would starve. Yeah, starve.

  16. Re:Optimal temperature range by Aqua+OS+X · · Score: 5, Funny

    No, they were on Noah'a ark. End of story. ;)

    --
    "Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
  17. what??? no they aren't by mikethebends · · Score: 3, Funny

    Dinosaurs aren't extinct...they terrorized an island back in 1993 or so, and a few years later made it to the mainland (San Diego, if memory serves.)
    It was in all the papers.
    Why can't we ever seem to live in peace with these noble, flightless birds? Sigh...

  18. Did you know? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Penguins have vestigial stingers.

    I think we know what happened to the bees.

  19. Re:Optimal temperature range by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Bees are much smaller than me, but I imagine I'm much more adaptable and mobile.

  20. Not again by JohnGrahamCumming · · Score: 5, Funny

    > despite what many researchers believe was a years-long period of darkness and frigid temperatures

    Please don't make me relive my teenage years...

  21. Re:Optimal temperature range by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Honeycomb's big? Yeah yeah yeah
    It's not small? No no no

  22. Re:Optimal temperature range by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I've never found you living in my eaves.

  23. Re:Beescile. by Linker3000 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Two major flaws in theory:

    1) AC electricity hadn't been discovered then.
    2) The refrigerator wasn't invented until the 1800s.

    --
    AT&ROFLMAO
  24. Re:mmmm chix-a-club by rjelks · · Score: 1, Funny

    Are you guys talking about SIMS?? I haven't gotten to the "night-club" level yet.

  25. Re:Beescile. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Last you checked!? You monster!

  26. What a croc got? by AtariAmarok · · Score: 4, Funny
    "What's a croc got that T-Rex didnt?"

    Some crazy aussie in shorts wrestling them on TV, what? Crikey!

    --
    Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
  27. Re:Optimal temperature range by rjelks · · Score: 2, Funny

    I admit that I didn't RTFA, but I thought insects were a lot bigger back then. With a difference in size, wouldn't that skew an experiment today?

  28. Re:Exactly by 3terrabyte · · Score: 2, Funny

    That was the first thought that came to my mind. I'm sure they had movies, like "Encino Bee", about cavebees unthawed into modern time. And much hilarity ensued.

    --

    Why are there only 19 people folding@home for slashdot?

  29. Re:Decimation?!?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    Decimation is the Roman Army practice of executing every tenth man in a unit to ensure discipline. This is usually done to deal with rebellion or crowdedness.

    Actually, they usually selected the most pedantic 10% of the group.

  30. Re:Decimation?!?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    "I get annoyed when this word is used incorrectly"

    Funny, I get annoyed when prissy word-police can't handle the changing use of a word.

  31. the truth is out there by mcmonkey · · Score: 2, Funny

    The honeybees survived because they'd been breed to introduce a genetically altered strain of smallpox meant to help spread the alien virus.

  32. Re:Exactly by PoopJuggler · · Score: 1, Funny

    For all we really know, the entire Earth could have been make of honey back then.

  33. As Winnie-the-Pooh once said... by sulli · · Score: 5, Funny

    You can never tell with bees.

    --

    sulli
    RTFJ.
  34. Re:Optimal temperature range by YetAnotherAnonymousC · · Score: 5, Funny

    European or tropical?

    But more important, what is their unladen airspeed velocity. And do you think tropical bees could carry a coconut to England? Or European bees?

  35. Location, Location, Location by TiggertheMad · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yes, and both of them had a 'southern bumpkin' accent. Carter was from the south, and Jr. was just dumb there.

    --

    HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
  36. Mystery solved. by Java+Ape · · Score: 2, Funny

    Based on what is known about the Cretaceous climate and modern tropical honeybees, Kozisek estimates that any post-impact winter event could not have dropped temperatures more than 4 to 13 degrees F (2-7C) without wiping out the bees. Current nuclear winter theories from the Chicxulub impact estimate drops of 13 to 22 degrees F (7-12C) - too cold for tropical honeybees. obviously, the temperature dropped by EXACTLY 13 F (7 C), the upper range of the bee's tolerance and the lower limit of current models. Where's the conflict? Do I win a nobel prize?

  37. Jeebus! by DogDude · · Score: 2, Funny

    Well, as most people in the US obviously know (51%, actually), dinosaurs never existed, and the planet was created only about 3000 years ago, and took 7 days. So, all of this is a moot point. Your "science" is no match for the Bible, which is REAL "science" (which somebody actually told me previously, with a straight face).

    --
    I don't respond to AC's.
  38. Aha! by njord · · Score: 2, Funny

    So this means that dinosaurs didn't really exist after all and that GOD created them!



    God 1, Science 1,000,000

  39. Re:Optimal temperature range by Aqua+OS+X · · Score: 2, Funny

    No, Jesus has already been appointed to that position. However, Pat Robinson will fill-in until he arrives. :)

    --
    "Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
  40. Re:Honey Bee Behavior by corbettw · · Score: 4, Funny

    hive intelligence.
    use google.


    Why? We're already using Slashdot, that should tell us everything we need to know about hive intelligence.

    --
    God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
  41. Re:But they weren't frozen by vsprintf · · Score: 3, Funny

    they're Still Here. That means there's something Wrong with the theory.

    And it's not hard to figure out. There was no asteroid impact. Dick Cheney wiped out the dinosaurs and started the rumors of asteroids of mass destruction for obvious oil-related reasons. It's a darned good thing for the bees that you can't run an SUV on honey. (Just kidding - it's post-election humor. :)

  42. That's easy - by CustomDesigned · · Score: 2, Funny
    Honeybees were on the ark!

    [This is intended to be "funny" or "food for thought". It is not at all clear, to say the least, that the Flood and the Extinction were the same event - even if you believe in the Flood as I do.]

  43. Re:Biggest flaw by Linker3000 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Hey - has anyone thought of asking the bees whether the light stays on?

    --
    AT&ROFLMAO