Aug 1, 2016 10:28 PM
http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/07/why-a...ove-wasps/
EXCERPT: [...] Next time, perhaps, you can console yourself by considering the wasp’s significance in human culture. To make their nests, wasps chew wood, turn it into pulp and spit it out in a process that creates a structure of hexagonal cells: one of the most exquisite artefacts you can find in the natural world.
Each nest is a small miracle: how do they make it so perfect? [...] A wasp nest is a thing of breathless wonder, and long ago some clever man, staring at one in China, had a eureka moment. He thought: this is not a nest. It’s a letter, a memorandum, an IOU, a billet-doux, a note to the milkman, a contract, a prayer book, the instructions, wisdom, folly, poetry, information, beautiful thoughts and the meaning of life. This is paper.
It happened some time during the Han dynasty, which ended in 220 AD, and naturally the story has been much mythologised. The earliest known bit of paper has been dated between 179 and 41 BC. Paper then spread slowly into the Islamic world and eventually into Europe. Paper was established in Spain in the 12th century and they were manufacturing it in England by the 16th century: infinitely easier than parchment, infinitely cheaper, and not liable to turn back into rawhide when it got wet. So now we could have lots more books. We could transmit knowledge. We could have mass culture.
Wasps changed the way we humans act as a species, but we have seldom shown much gratitude, or for that matter much sense. We have created a series of chemicals that kill invertebrates, never thinking for a second that it’s actually quite a good idea to look after insects. In parts of China they’ve got rid of insects so efficiently that they have to pollinate their fruit trees by hand. Wasps are important pollinators....
EXCERPT: [...] Next time, perhaps, you can console yourself by considering the wasp’s significance in human culture. To make their nests, wasps chew wood, turn it into pulp and spit it out in a process that creates a structure of hexagonal cells: one of the most exquisite artefacts you can find in the natural world.
Each nest is a small miracle: how do they make it so perfect? [...] A wasp nest is a thing of breathless wonder, and long ago some clever man, staring at one in China, had a eureka moment. He thought: this is not a nest. It’s a letter, a memorandum, an IOU, a billet-doux, a note to the milkman, a contract, a prayer book, the instructions, wisdom, folly, poetry, information, beautiful thoughts and the meaning of life. This is paper.
It happened some time during the Han dynasty, which ended in 220 AD, and naturally the story has been much mythologised. The earliest known bit of paper has been dated between 179 and 41 BC. Paper then spread slowly into the Islamic world and eventually into Europe. Paper was established in Spain in the 12th century and they were manufacturing it in England by the 16th century: infinitely easier than parchment, infinitely cheaper, and not liable to turn back into rawhide when it got wet. So now we could have lots more books. We could transmit knowledge. We could have mass culture.
Wasps changed the way we humans act as a species, but we have seldom shown much gratitude, or for that matter much sense. We have created a series of chemicals that kill invertebrates, never thinking for a second that it’s actually quite a good idea to look after insects. In parts of China they’ve got rid of insects so efficiently that they have to pollinate their fruit trees by hand. Wasps are important pollinators....
