Bees can add and subtract, according to a scientific study

A study has shown that brain size is not necessary to develop abstract operations such as mathematics, to verify that bees can solve sums and subtractions satisfactorily, announced today. researchers from an Australian university.

The experience, according to
The announcement of RMIT University of Melbourne opens a door in the field of artificial intelligence and promises improvements in rapid learning processes.

The study, published
in the journal Science Advances, he showed that "a big brain is not necessary to perform mathematical operations".

"The relationship between brain size and power to develop abstract operations" was the focus of the study, pointing out that "to understand mathematics, a very sophisticated cognitive level is needed".

According to the experts, in this process, "the long-term memory interacts, that is to say the one that contains the rules of addition and subtraction, and in the short term, it is in charge of manipulating the figures of a specific operation ".

Many nonhuman species are able to understand the differences between quantities and apply them to solving everyday problems, but solving arithmetic operations requires a more complex level of brain processing, the scientists explained.

L & # 39; s experience

As the results of the experiment indicate, bees can learn to recognize colors as symbolic representations of addition and subtraction, and then use that knowledge to solve arithmetic problems.

The bees were dragged into a Y-shaped labyrinth. Upon entering, they saw between one and five different shapes painted blue or yellow. Yellow represents a subtraction and blue a sum.

After seeing the initial shapes, the bees had to fly to the left or the right. There they would find the same series of colorful shapes, but with one or more shapes.

That is to say that if at the beginning there were three yellow shapes, in the left chamber, there would be four yellow shapes and in the right, two yellow shapes. In this case, the correct answer would be to fly right, because the yellow represents a subtraction and the number of initial forms was three.

The bees were rewarded with a sweet solution if they were right in their decision and they were punished with a bitter solution if they were wrong.

At the beginning of the experiment, the bees made random decisions but, after about seven hours of experience, they learned that blue meant +1 and yellow -1, which allowed them to solve problems.

Scientists altered the arithmetic operations and the location of the response randomly. The results indicated that the percentage of correct answers far exceeded what could have been generated by chance.

Mathematics and non-human animals

As is known, bees are not the only non-human species able to add and subtract, because other scientific studies have shown that some primates, birds and even spiders have this ability: they know how much prey are trapped in their web.

About 80 years ago, scientific studies proved that crows could perform simple digital tasks.

In addition, small fish benefit from swimming in the banks and it is important to distinguish the most numerous because they are better protected against predators.

In addition, a study published in the journal Science in 2006 showed that desert ants counted their efforts to find the nest when they returned.

And another recent study has shown that some frogs, like túngara, add two notes if a man responds, and he has to follow it and add another one. They quickly sing up to six or seven notes and if the male is wrong, they end the conversation.

In the case of dogs, it seems that they can get an idea of ​​the numbers, although several studies have indicated that they "do not use it".

With information from Telam and Science Advances agency