Mimicry and neodarwinism

Say what? In what way are bees generally cryptic as opposed to aposematic?Superfamily Apoidea has lots of aposematic species - they're really some of the classic examples of it. Those Eristalis species usually mimic those bright, contrasting color patterns. As an aside, one of my favorite cerambycid (longhorn beetle) genera, Neoclytus, has a number of species that mimic wasps as adults, like this N. acuminatus:

Selection is not omnipotent. It is contingent on the environment and on the material it has to work with. If crypsis is the most effective strategy available for some bees then it will be selected for by definition.And your own comments indicate that non-visual warnings may serve in place of aposematic colouration.

Can you provide a reference for bees being specifically cryptic? Bees are a pretty heterogenous group and I'm pretty sure there are species which use aposematic signals, escpecially in Bombus.TTFN,WKEdited by Wounded King, : Changed subtitle

What kind of screwy logic is that? Insects cannot be selected to look like leaves or twigs because they do not develop in the same way plants do? Anyone who would argue from such biological ignorance should not be on a science board.

No this is quite incorrect all the way around. Even a small resemblance of the model gives a selective advantage because it makes it slightly less likely that the animal will be eaten. Tuning to the model occurs because closer resemblence gives even more protection for the animal which possesses the trait. And I have never heard this "well established Darwinian explanation" for mimicry, somehow that was left out of the courses I took in Insect Ecology and Animal Ecology - both of which addressed the phenomenon of mimicry. So where pray tell do you get your knowledge?

The more distasteful models there are, the more likely that a predator has encountered one and thus knows to avoid that particular pattern. It is not complicated. Simple old strength in numbers.

Bees that have mimics are not cryptic. Here is a robber fly bee mimic capturing its model bee. I think you will agree that neither the mimic nor the bee is cryptic in any usual sense of the word.ATSHQ: American Tarantula & Animals

You scold Jar for bringing up mimicry in vertebrates and now you want to talk mushrooms? Not all bright colors/patterns are examples of warning coloration. Propose a new topic if you wish to discuss it.

Honey bees as I know them from Central Europe are in no way conspicuous:TrekNature | Eristalis tenax Photo"This hoverfly is an excellent honey bee mimic, so much so that it is often wrongly featured in photographs of bees":http://www.plantpress.com/wildlife/search.php?name=erista...Neither bees nor hoverfly are conspicuous. Point is, that wasps and hornets are. So according darwinism the same selective pressure on these insects bees/wasps - both having stings to protect themselves - should have had totaly different outcome: aposematic hornets/cryptic bees.
Or was selective pressure different on bees?

I agree that that particular bee doesn't seem to be aposematic, but cryptic? It may shock you that I found the cunnungly hidden brown bee on that green leaf. As crypsis goes this fellow is not in the leaf insect category. I can see however that perhaps in a pollen rich region of the flower he might blend in rather better.And as others have shown a lot of bees, especially bumble bees, do have highly conspicuous aposematic colouring, rather reminicent in fact of the aposematic colouring of wasps and hornets. This figure shows 3 species 2 of Bombus, B. soroeensis and B. terrestris, as well as Apis mellifera.TTFN,WK

This message vanished(?), so I resend it: Yet this claim contradicts Nijhout conclusion as to origin of Papilio dardanus mimics as wellas conclusions of Helioconus (see my first post in the thread). Even great Bates as darwinist supposed great starting resemblance between butterfflies mimic species to mislead birds and only them small steps could proceed.Yet I suppose that same predators should be present in same area to enable darwinian fancy to present its explanations as science. But do darwinian have enough fantasy to explain even origin of mimetism described by Poulton, when mimics and his model lived in different and distatnt areas?
For instance Limenitis albomaculata lives in West China and their model - males Hypolimnas misippus - southeast Asia? Strona gwna | Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w PoznaniuAccueil | INRAE INSTIT

MartinV,You don't seem to have any coherent argument against neo-darwinism. All you have produced here is a string of one after another arguments from incredulity.As soon as one example is addressed you skip onto a new one, anything from leaves to mushrooms.Do you have any argument that isn't on eof simple incredulity? Anthing that might actually argue for a prescribed evolution as Davison subscribes to?TTFN,WK

WoundedKing,all these examples shows that some internal factors should be accepted as creative force independent from mutation/selection.
Darwinistic attempts to explain these mentioned phenomenons are
fairy-tales. One claims that there is no selective pressure to males of Papilio darnanus to mimics anybody, another say (Darwin itself) that females do prefer only males that do not change, even though we now see, that males developed their patterns on wings most recently and females are archaic.Wasp are aposematic, bees not. If bees would look like wasps, darwinists would say - look, Mullerian mimicry, both have advantage to be tasted/eaten only half.
But why do not bees protect themselves also by aposematism I see no explanation, selective pressure should be same as to wasps.Mushroom are really interesting, totally overlooked by darwinists.
They did not exist for them.This thread is on mimicry - I agree that mushrooms and plants should be discussed in other thread - yet I see no reason to limit myself only to some examples. Maybe is here a reader, who likes these examples of mimicry (as me), that darwinists like to overlook and left unexplained , or even better trying these to stretch on Prokrusts bed of mutation/selection .

You still haven't supported this statement. They do, in many species. You say that the European honey bees you're familiar with are cryptic? We are talking about Apis mellifera here, right? With the classic yellow and black stripes on the abdomen? Like this one: Also, that first picture of Eristalis tenax you linked to (although oddly, you seemed to indicate that the link was for a honey bee) wasn't exactly typical of its patterning. Here's a dorsal view, showing a typical (and aposematic) patterning of that species, yellow and black: I'd love to see these cryptic honeybees you're talking about!

They do, in terms of yellow/black aposematic signalling, and they do. They do, why not read some more of the replies you get.I'not sure why you assume that all of the selective pressures should be the same. Many bees and wasps fillquite distinct ecological niches, why should the selective pressures operating on them be identical? You really just say whatever comes into your head don't you? Do you have any evidence to back up this claim? All of your arguments from incredulity have had the ssame whiny complaint that neo-Darwinist's ignore this absolute nail in their coffin, and this seems to invariably turn out to be untrue, suggesting that you might be better employed looking into more recent literature to see what neo-Darwinist's actually do say.TTFN,WK