Honeybee Expert to Speak at Bennington
Honeybee expert, science communicator, and Cornell professor Thomas Seeley will give a lecture on Thursday, November 5, at 7:30 pm in Bennington College’s CAPA Symposium. The event, this year’s Robert H. Woodworth Lecture in the Sciences, is free and open to the public.
Thomas Seeley will lead a conversation about how bees evaluate potential nest sites, advertise their discoveries to one another, engage in open deliberation, and choose their new home. A swarm of honeybees chooses of their new dwelling place collectively and democratically. They stake their future on a process that includes collective fact-finding, vigorous debate, and consensus building. This exploration of animal behavior shows that decision-making groups, whether honeybee or human, can be smarter than even the smartest individuals in them.
Thomas Seeley teaches animal behavior and conducts research on the functional organization of honeybee colonies at Cornell. He has received the Alexander von Humboldt Distinguished U.S. Scientist Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Gold Medal Book Award from Apimondia, and he has been elected a Fellow of both the Animal Behavior Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His efforts to ensure scientific research is accessible to general audiences makes him a frequent commentator in the media. His most enduring honor is to have had a species of bee named after him: Neocorynurella seeleyi.
Following his lecture, he will lead a workshop on science writing for a general audience on Friday, November 6, from 1:00–2:00 pm, in the College’s Dickinson Science Building, room 232. This is also free and open to the public.