Human interactions with insects

Practical uses include as food, in medicine, for the valuable textile silk, for dyestuffs such as carmine, in science, where the fruit fly is an important model organism in genetics, and in warfare, where insects were successfully used in the Second World War to spread disease in enemy populations.

Writers like William Morton Wheeler, Maurice Maeterlinck, and Jean Henri Fabre described insect life and communicated their meaning to people "with imagination and brilliance".

[3][4] Hogue argued that "Humans spend their intellectual energies in three basic areas of activity: surviving, using practical learning (the application of technology); seeking pure knowledge through inductive mental processes (science); and pursuing enlightenment to taste a pleasure by aesthetic exercises that may be referred to as the 'humanities.'

Morris considers this "quite unhelpful, if not misleading", and offers instead his own research into the multiple ways that the people of Malawi relate to insects and other animals: "pragmatic, intellectual, realist, practical, aesthetic, symbolic and sacramental.

[9] The Xerces Society calculates the economic impact of four ecological services rendered by insects: pollination, recreation (i.e. "the importance of bugs to hunting, fishing, and wildlife observation, including bird-watching"), dung burial, and pest control.

[10] As the ant expert[11] E. O. Wilson observed: "If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago.

[13] The Washington Post stated: "We are flying blind in many aspects of preserving the environment, and that's why we are so surprised when a species like the honeybee starts to crash, or an insect we don't want, the Asian tiger mosquito or the fire ant, appears in our midst.

They also note that some societies in sub-Saharan Africa prefer caterpillars to beef, while Chakravorty et al. (2011)[20] point out that food insects (highly appreciated in North-East India) are more expensive than meat.

TCM uses arthropods for various purposes; for example, centipede is used to treat tetanus, seizures, and convulsions,[34] while the Chinese Black Mountain Ant, Polyrhachis vicina, is used as a cure all, especially by the elderly, and extracts have been examined as a possible anti-cancer agent.

[33] Propolis, a resinous, waxy mixture collected by honeybees and used as a hive insulator and sealant, is often consumed by menopausal women because of its high hormone content, and it is said to have antibiotic, anesthetic, and anti-inflammatory properties.

Because of its small size, short generation time and high fecundity, the common fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster was selected as a model organism for studies of the genetics of higher eukaryotes.

[49] Additional uses of this traditional product include the waxing of citrus fruits to extend their shelf-life, and the coating of pills to moisture-proof them, provide slow-release or mask the taste of bitter ingredients.

[51][52][53][54][55] Insect attributes are sometimes mimicked in architecture, as at the Eastgate Centre, Harare, which uses passive cooling, storing heat in the morning and releasing it in the warm parts of the day.

[57][58] The properties of the Namib desert beetle's exoskeleton, in particular its wing-cases (elytra) which have bumps with hydrophilic (water-attracting) tips and hydrophobic (water-shedding) sides, have been mimicked in a film coating designed for the British Ministry of Defence, to capture water in arid regions.

[59][60] Silkworms, the caterpillars and pupae of the moth Bombyx mori, have been reared to produce silk in China from the Neolithic Yangshao period onwards, c. 5000 BC.

[71] Flies also appear on Old Babylonian seals as symbols of Nergal, the god of death[71] and fly-shaped lapis lazuli beads were often worn by many different cultures in ancient Mesopotamia, along with other kinds of fly-jewellery.

Most "awakening" customs are related to eating snacks like pancakes, parched beans, pears, and fried corn, symbolizing harmful insects in the field.

[77] Many people believe the urban myth that the daddy longlegs (Opiliones) has the most poisonous bite in the spider world, but that the fangs are too small to penetrate human skin.

None of the known species of harvestmen have venom glands; their chelicerae are not hollowed fangs but grasping claws that are typically very small and definitely not strong enough to break human skin.

[80] In the Brazilian Amazon, members of the Tupí–Guaraní language family have been observed using Pachycondyla commutata ants during female rite-of-passage ceremonies, and prescribing the sting of Pseudomyrmex spp.

[81] The red harvester ant Pogonomyrmex californicus has been widely used by natives of Southern California and Northern Mexico for hundreds of years in ceremonies conducted to help tribe members acquire spirit helpers through hallucination.

[84] The Canadian entomologist Charles Howard Curran's 1945 book, Insects of the Pacific World, noted women from India and Sri Lanka, who kept 1+1⁄2 inch (38 mm) long, iridescent greenish coppery beetles of the species Chrysochroa ocellata as pets.

[87][88] The naturalist Ian MacRae writes of butterflies: the animal is at once awkward, flimsy, strange, bouncy in flight, yet beautiful and immensely sympathetic; it is painfully transient, albeit capable of extreme migrations and transformations.

Reviews of the exhibit offered a compelling narrative for cultural entomology: "the unexpected use of materials, dark overtones, and the straightforward impact of thousands of tiny multiples within the space.

William Shakespeare, inspired by Aeschylus, has Tom o'Bedlam in King Lear, "Whom the foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame, through ford and whirlpool, o'er bog and quagmire", driven mad by the constant pursuit.

[94] H. G. Wells introduced giant wasps in his 1904 novel The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth,[95] making use of the newly discovered growth hormones to lend plausibility to his science fiction.

[100] Horror films involving insects, sometimes called "big bug movies", include the pioneering 1954 Them!, featuring giant ants mutated by radiation, and the 1957 The Deadly Mantis.

[112] In astronomy, constellations named after arthropods include the zodiacal Scorpius, the scorpion,[113][114] and Musca, the fly, also known as Apis, the bee, in the deep southern sky.

It is perfectly bipolar, and until recently, the central star was unobservable, clouded by gas, but estimated to be one of the hottest in the galaxy – 200,000 degrees Fahrenheit, perhaps 35 times hotter than the Sun.

Jody Shapiro and Rick Gilbert were responsible for translating the research and concepts that Isabella Rossellini envisioned into the paper and paste costumes which directly contribute to the series' unique visual style.