New research shows that the insects flying around the streetlights are in fact in living hell that we made for bugs.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-44785-3
Essentially, their tiny bug brains think the light is the sunset, so they keep turning to keep the “sun” at the same angle so they can go “straight.” No matter how far they fly, they don’t make any progress. They are trapped in this little hell we made just for them, not understanding why they can’t get to where they are going.
I wonder how bugs will evolve to adapt to this. I wonder if we could see bughavior change within our lifetimes
We already have. Not with this specific trait, but definitely with other ones.
Oh i bet, bugs evolve fast
One evening I built a campfire to keep warm on the banks of a river in southern France. As the fire got going, millions of moths poured from the trees into the flames. As the numbers increased the flames leapt higher, and the moths became the fuel. The horror, the horror…
Like moths to a… Yeah
All the best scientific articles use phrases like “in living hell”.
So sciencey.
What?
Hell is the most scientific of all locations.
Hail science!!!
Are they getting much science done down there? Obviously it must be helpful that all of history’s greatest scientific minds are gathered in one place – but if nobody’s serving them breakfast then maybe they’re perpetually hypoglycemic and not doing much good thinking.
I understood that reference.
I’m so sorry.
Lmao suck it
@Shkshkshk @science I read this too a few weeks ago, and it got the old noggin joggin’.
What if some higher lifeform has done the same to us? Our sun could be the gods’ bathroom light.
Lol get fucked
They are trapped in this little hell we made just for them, not understanding why they can’t get to where they are going.
same
@RobotToaster it is a vibe
is the toaster ok
The toaster is brave. The vacuum, however…
Open flames are more humane. Then they just burn up so they’re not trapped forever.
That just sounds like making a metaphorical hell literal
@Kolanaki brings a whole new meaning to “all those bugs should be burning in hell”
Spiders do be happy tho.
Unless you try to take a picture of them. The autofocus spooks them
I learned this back in the 90s, I’m surprised new research is needed.
The solution seems to be LED lighting. The right LED bulbs don’t trigger the bug brains.
According to this study LED lights made no difference.
Which LEDs? LEDs are pretty much all giving off the same two colors to make white: blue and yellow (in a single chip made of a blue LED and yellow uv-reactive phosphor). Warm white, cool white, same thing just varying intensities of each color. Only cheap color-changing LEDs (now) will use R/G/B chips lit together without dedicated white chips. What wavelengths are they tracking?
Shout out Shuji Nakamura, inventor of the blue LED. Kinda broke the whole thing wide open.
why would they break their own invention?
I also watched that last week.
@alvvayson Existing research was about “how do we stop the bugs from circling our lights?”. This is about *why* the bugs circle the lights. It artificially triggers the dorsal reflex, which disorients the bugs.
Well I can’t see at night so cry about it, bugs.
