[FRIAM] Miller, miller moths everywhere...

Tue May 19 12:13:10 EDT 2020

Steve, 

Re stories, that’s probably why I was drawn to Darwinism.  Every Darwinian explanation, no matter how sophisticated, is a story, a historical narrative, arising from plausible suppositions about the way things were.  Last time I read the literature, the mitochondrial data on humans suggested that we arose from a single, smallish, group in southern Africa.  If that’s not an idiographic (as opposed to nomothetic) account, I don’t know what is. 

Nick 

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

 <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Steve Smith
Sent: Tuesday, May 19, 2020 9:04 AM
To: friam at redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Miller, miller moths everywhere...

Nick -

I *like* this kind of anecdotal/vernacular science.   I think Glen might refer to these stories/ideas as "just so stories" because they seem to be post-hoc fitting of simple yet in some sense apt models to anecdotal data gathered ad-hoc but widely.    I think I understand (and agree) with his (implied) judgment of them as being "real science" but they smack of something more than "wishful thinking", maybe "whimsical thinking"?  And a sort of proto-science.  Or a collective form of knowledge/wisdom formation which lacks the formal rigor of modern science.  Related to what Dave appeals to with us perhaps in Jung and other ideas of collective consciousness.   A step away from believing that the cosmos and everyday life are ordered by a (the) angry/benevolent god(esses) toward believing something perhaps equally absurd, that everything is ordered by mathematics. 

My father was second-generation college educated... with a BS in biology preparing him for an advanced degree in Forestry (soil and range science), and his parents before him both held BS degrees in Geology.   But they were all still rooted in a style of understanding the world (minerals, plants and animals, and people) which was roughly animistic... they all still lived physically close to the earth and virtually all of their relatives were still living in the hills and hollers of Appalachia.  This could easily explain why I "like" the anecdotal/vernacular and distrust the *over* application of mathematics.

I've rattled on before about the *explanatory* power of models and the hypotheses they embody vs *predictive* or *communicative* or *descriptive* or even *inspirational*.   These are not orthogonal, but I think still useful...  a "descriptive" model of the utlity/power of scientific thinking/modeling?

- Steve

FWIW... re: Jon's report on their nutritive value, my young chickens (6 weeks today?) have been foraging in our courtyard for about a week during the day.   At first they showed significant interest in the flies that would occasion their feeder, but seemed to learn quickly that they were not fast enough to catch them, and soon discovered the myriad ground insects that they could find by pecking and scratching.   I was sitting on a low wall next to a couple of them... they seem to like the company of humans and will come close and do their foraging near me, even though I rarely hand feed them.   I looked down and one was swallowing a very large grey-brown object which I am now sure was a miller.  The miller moth infestation/epidemic/peak at my house (near the Rio Grande) seems to have lagged that of the one in Santa Fe and even just up the Pojoaque Valley where people have been reporting the deluge for weeks.   Ours just started a few days ago.

Speaking of anecdotal and just-so science stories.   I find it fascinating to note that these birds, supposedly not THAT removed from their wild ancestors are constructed from a single *large enough to eat for breakfast* egg-cell in about 20 days and emerge almost fully able to survive alone (though they benefit from the warmth and protection and guidance of a mother hen, or some people with a heat-lamp and some agri-industrially formulated food and our own curiosity).  And then, not too much later, they begin to "shed an egg" nearly daily (if you keep taking them away) which if fertilized, would repeat the construction, growth process right in front of my eyes.   Aside from their daily egg-gift, I look forward to their help in insect control in my garden.... I can tolerate many pests in the garden but some years we get grasshoppers and squash bugs, each who can decimate a crop.   

I've always enjoyed watching the Sphynx/Hummingbird moths around the homestead, but did not know their larval form was the "dreaded" tomato worm.   Last year, I was surprised to see that along with my tomatoes, they had discovered the volunteer datura that come up here and there around the property and two or three had ganged up on one plant and stripped it bare of leaves.    I wondered at how their metabolism handled the kind of alkaloids that humans (and cattle?) experience as "loco weed".  The datura, with it's heavily cholorphylled and thick stems seemed to survive just fine and put out a fresh bounty of (smaller?) leaves and returned to it's course of producing flowers to be pollinated by (also the sphynx?) and then a seedpod to lead to this year's surprise sprouts?!

Hi, Merle, 

Are you sure it’s not 19 years?  The standard “take” on insect eruptions is (used to be?) that they occur on a cycle of prime numbers to make it harder for creatures with shorter cycles to “track” them.  See https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/the-cicadas-love-affair-with-prime-numbers for a pretty thin introduction to the idea. 

N

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

 <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

From: Friam  <mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com> <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Merle Lefkoff
Sent: Monday, May 18, 2020 10:01 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group  <mailto:friam at redfish.com> <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Miller, miller moths everywhere...

My son in Boulder says they get the "infestation" right on the dot every 20 years.

They are also important pollinators.  

On Mon, May 18, 2020 at 9:57 PM Jon Zingale <jonzingale at gmail.com <mailto:jonzingale at gmail.com> > wrote:

Wow, they are everywhere! According to wikipedia:

Army cutworms are one of the richest foods for predators, such as  <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_bear> brown bears, in this ecosystem, where up to 72 per cent of the moth's body weight is fat, thus making it more calorie-rich than elk or deer. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army_cutworm#cite_note-10> [10] This is the highest known body fat percentage of any animal. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army_cutworm#cite_note-11> [11] 

And according to the New Mexican:

`... they do not carry disease, Formby said, and they’re not the type of moth that will get into your clothes closet and start shredding your new camel hair jacket.`

-- --- .-. . .-.. --- -.-. -.- ... -..-. .- .-. . -..-. - .... . -..-. . ... ... . -. - .. .- .-.. -..-. .-- --- .-. -.- . .-. ...
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam> 
un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ 

-- 

Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D.
President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy
emergentdiplomacy.org <http://emergentdiplomacy.org> 

Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

merlelefkoff at gmail.com <mailto:merlelefoff at gmail.com> 
mobile:  (303) 859-5609
skype:  merle.lelfkoff2

twitter: @Merle_Lefkoff

-- --- .-. . .-.. --- -.-. -.- ... -..-. .- .-. . -..-. - .... . -..-. . ... ... . -. - .. .- .-.. -..-. .-- --- .-. -.- . .-. ...
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200519/fa3bdb32/attachment.html>