Other Insect Societies (eBook)

James T. Costa (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2006
812 Seiten
Harvard University Press (Verlag)
978-0-674-27161-6 (ISBN)

Infos

Asked to name an insect society, most of us--whether casual or professional students of nature--quickly point to one of the so-called eusocial marvels: the ant colony, the beehive, the termite mound, the wasp nest. Each is awe-inspiring in its division of labor--collective defense, foraging, and nestbuilding. Yet E. O. Wilson cautioned back in 1971 that sociality should be defined more broadly, "e;in order to prevent the arbitrary exclusion of many interesting phenomena."e; Thirty-five years later, James T. Costa gives those interesting phenomena their due. He argues that, in trying to solve the puzzle of how highly eusocial behaviors evolved in a few insect orders, evolutionary biologists have neglected the more diverse social arrangements in the remaining twenty-eight orders--insect societies that don't fit the eusocial schema. Costa synthesizes here for the first time the scattered literature about social phenomena across the arthropod phylum: beetles and bugs, caterpillars and cockroaches, mantids and membracids, sawflies and spiders. This wide-ranging tour takes a rich narrative approach that interweaves theory and data analysis with the behavior and ecology of these remarkable groups. This comprehensive treatment is likely to inspire a new generation of naturalists to take a closer look.

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 30.9.2006
• Mitarbeit: Kommentare: Edward O. Wilson
• Vorwort: Bert Holldobler
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Natur / Technik ► Naturführer
• Themenwelt: Schulbuch / Wörterbuch ► Lexikon / Chroniken
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie ► Zoologie
• ISBN-10: 0-674-27161-0 / 0674271610
• ISBN-13: 978-0-674-27161-6 / 9780674271616