The Colony and its Organization 
35 
same. If one’s knowledge of the circumstances surround¬ 
ing his bees is not adequate there seems to be comfort in 
attributing to “locality” one’s failure in the application of 
rules. 
Point of view. 
It may be worth while to extend these introductory re¬ 
marks to explain the point of view held in the present dis¬ 
cussion of bee activities. There are several distinct angles 
from which one may view the actions of a colony of bees and, 
since they lead to unreconcilable conclusions, they cannot 
all be correct. First to be mentioned among those who 
write concerning bees is the so-called student of nature who 
seemingly tries to find in bees a type of intelligence even 
higher than that possessed by man and who attributes to 
these insects thoughts and passions to which only the poetic 
may hope to attain. The complex colony life of bees offers 
to such a type of mind unlimited opportunity for speculation, 
which leads nowhere and is in fact a detriment to legitimate 
investigation. Allied to the just mentioned enthusiasts 
over nature are the amateur philosophers who hold up the 
bee as a brilliant example of industry. To all such specu¬ 
lative fancy, we may with profit turn our backs. 
In studying the behavior of any lower animal, there is but 
one source to which one should go for information. This is 
found in the actions of the animal in response to stimuli of 
its environment. If the bee makes a visible movement in re¬ 
sponse to a stimulus arising in its environment, 1 that visible 
movement and nothing else is of value in forming a conclu¬ 
sion. If there is a movement or other response inside the 
animal or otherwise invisible, or if the bee perceives the 
stimulus but does not move in response, then the observer 
has a negative result. It is frequent in bee literature to find 
1 The environmental factor may be inside or outside the hive, or even 
inside or outside the individual bee. For example, pathogenic micro¬ 
organisms or irritating foods are inside but not part of the animal and are 
therefore environmental factors. 
