What do bees symbolize

carlowplayer

Would they sumbolise the collective and thus the lack of autonomy and individuality or the other way around? What type of social metaphor would they symbolise with regards to human behaviour or human social behaviour

El_Duderino 09

Maybe this isn't what you're looking for but the first thing I thought of is pollination and the interconnection of life. Einstein studied bees for a bit and concluded that if bees disappeared tomorrow, humans would have only 4 years of life left.

So for me bees symbolise the delicate balance of life.

Peregrinus

Symbolism is something we invest in a subject, not something the subject inherently possesses. So the short answer is that bees symbolise what we want them to symbolise.

Conventionally, we invoke them to symbolise industry - "as busy as a bee". They could certainly symbolise collective endeavour and lack of individual autonomy, but for some reason we usually invoke ants for this purpose, rather than bees.

El Duderino's suggestion that they could symbolise ecological interconnection is well-made, though to be effective as such a symbol their pivotal role in plant propagation, including the propagation of plants that we depend on, would have to be very well-known, to the point almost of being proverbial. (If a symbol is to be useful, you shouldn't have to explain it immediately after using it. We don't have to explain why bees are considered busy.)

Bees - particularly the buzzing of bees - symbolise high summer, and the feeling of lazy satisfaction that accompanies it. The crops are sown, they are not yet ready for harvest, the weather is fine, so we can relax and recreate. The association of bees with honey, and therefore with sweetness, reinforces this connection with pleasant relaxation.

Torakx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee_%28mythology%29

The bee, found in Ancient Near East and Aegean cultures, was believed to be the sacred insect that bridged the natural world to the underworld. Appearing in tomb decorations, Mycenaean tholos tombs were shaped as beehives.
Bee motifs are also seen in Maya cultures, an example being the Ah-Muzen-Cab, the Bee God, found in Maya ruins, likely designating honey-producing cities (who prized honey as food of the gods).

Apparently the priestesses were called bees as well.

Diddley Squat

teamwork and coperation

Black Swan

Emile Durkheim elaborated upon the the Division of Labour in Society (1893 book), which may have some value from both symbolic and comparative species standpoints. For example, bees exhibit a high level of specialisation (DOL), as well as cooperation between specialisations to achieve hive objectives, which we can compare to human career specialisations (DOL) that cooperate to achieve their organisational objectives.

MRnotlob606

Maybe bees represent a feudal sort of order ?

Autonomous Cowherd

There is reputedly a mysterious Sufi order called the Sarmouni brotherhood, whose name means the Bee(s)...symbolising their job to preserve the secret lore.

“True knowledge, it is asserted, exists as a positive commodity, like the honey of the bee. Like honey, it can be accumulated. From time to time in human history, however, it lies unused and starts to leak away. On those occasions the Sarmouni and their associates all over the world collect it and store it in a special receptacle. Then, when the time is ripe, they release it into the world again, through specially trained emissaries.”

(Gurdjieff)

countrynosebag

A secret society, enclosed.
There are many. I was also,thinking of nuns but that is due to experience of a convent.

shaymus27

I think they represent a social metaphor for Communism.

It's obvious really.

They are all equal except for one leader (the queen bee).

They each have a job based on the collective.

They work selflessly for the hole.

Just because Communism didn't work in the Soviet Union doesn't mean it will never work anywhere if tried again. Based on the collective work and industry of bees we should consider Communism as a viable political solution to the problems of a now discredited Capitalist system. Capitalism isn't working so why simply say Communism didn't work? Why not try Communism?

shaymus27

In Star Trek, the Borg are a collective of "machines". Some are part human/alien and part machine.

They each work on behalf of the collective. They are linked to each other.

They are ruthlessly efficient in self-preservation and furthering the aims of the collective.

In a lot of ways they are similar to Bees.

The problem with the Borg is that they did not care about anyone or anything other than themselves.

If the traits of the Borg are transplaced instead of Bees, then perhaps this would indicate the ultimate destruction of the planet by humans if they behaved like bees.

Under the old Soviet Union, there was no respect for the planet or ecology. Perhaps the self-actualising objective of bees or humans in a Communist Political solution might lead to an insular, human-centred approach which might ultimately be destructive to the very planet we live on.

Simply focusing on the collective without embracing other aspects of existence could potentially be harmful and destructive.

Ultimately bees have humans to adversely affect their existence but also have humans to correct threats to their existence.

If humans were to adopt the collective form of existence of bees, there would be no safety net as exists for bees. It could well be dangerous to adopt their collective order.

eternal

In some ways bees are a reflection of humans as they organise themselves around a leader and have a kind of societal method of living. Inherently self sufficient, they can become agitated when kept from their routine. It seems that their actions are solely based on self preservation of themselves and the Queen. They nest and travel as humans do daily but are part of the stratified levels of the feeding order yet have defense mechanisms strong enough to survive. The use if the term 'swarm' reminds us that they are social and not isolated mainly. Therefore they are collective, not individual and are strongly group orientated.