12 Year Old Penis Diagram

"free beats fee"

If you are interested in behavioral economics or simply oddities of our consumer amuse you, I recommend Dan's book is Ariel (really) I decide . A pure gem of humor, funny experiments and especially a good lesson in humility when it comes to our understanding of consumer behavior. Right price, rational choices, decisions under uncertainty, ethical all our alleged economic rationality and it spends its spring book with the delightful feeling of ê still be a little more interesting than the simplistic models in which economic theory attempts to reduce us.

Are you Lindt or Hershey?
The theme of free seemed particularly intriguing. Ariely notes archly that free makes us a little crazy: he only has to see the packed crowd at museums, first Sunday of each month when entry is FREE Paris. To save a few dollars, people are willing to lose a lot of time (as if it had no value) to visit exhibitions saturated with visitors, while n & # 39, y had probably not many people the day before or the week after. And not to be a marketing ace known for the power of seduction of unlimited formulas. The movie passes or passes of the Internet (or mobile) have really taken off were when offered unlimited plans.
Ariely has designed the following experiment to test the difference between a ridiculously low price and completely free: on a stand, he proposed choice of a premium chocolate (Lindt of) 15 cents or a low-end (a Hershey) for 1 penny. 73% of consumers preferred to pay 15 cents to Lindt. The next day, he offered the Lindt to 14 cents and the Hershey Free. To the great surprise of researchers, people chose this time to 69% a Hershey! However, a discount of 1 cent on the two products should not normally change the benefit - cost analysis between the two options and should have no influence on consumer choice:

Suppose that Lindt provides 50 units of pleasure only 5 cons for Hershey.
Pay 15 cents for Lindt provides a net profit of 50-15 = 35 5-1 = 4 cons for Hershey. Lindt advantage.
The next day, Lindt offers a net profit of 50-14 = 36 5-0 = 5 cons for Lindt. Advantage unchanged for Lindt!

The same experience happens when the Hershey cents from February to January was not the same effect. The irresistible attraction of free therefore failure is the classic model of cost-benefit analysis. Ariely explains the psychological effect the lack of risk taking that means free. "In my opinion, he writes, because human beings have an inherent fear of the loss. In choosing a free product, there was obviously nothing to lose. However, if one is interested in an article in charge, then, yes, we risk making a bad decision - And end up losing. Therefore face a choice, prefer the free product. "

And if everything was a matter of ratio?
There may be some truth in this thesis, but personally I would go for a more direct explanation. If the traditional analysis of earnings calculated as the difference between perceived value and cost is at fault, it may simply be that and is not good. I suspect we reason in terms of "ROI" (gain / expenditure) rather than "net income" (gain-cost). So that when the expenditure is zero yield becomes infinite and our decision criteria panic! That's why we resumed the chocolate mousse at the Bistrot Romain until it make you sick. As long as no hidden costs not reintroduced a denominator non-zero, "Free beats Fee" and we prefer the free to anything else. This hypothesis

report gain / expenditure as a criterion for decision pleases me well for several reasons. First, it is consistent with other observations paradoxical. According to the classical theory is eaten anything that seems interesting, as soon as the utility exceeds the cost. If it was If we do not observe much difference between purchase intentions measured in marketing research and actual sales of products once marketed ;. My hypothesis explains this difference very easily: it buys only when the benefit / cost seems high enough, beyond d & # 39, a decision threshold may vary depending on our mood, context ... and state of our finances. The gap between interest and purchase decision is quite understandable.

This explanation is also in line with the loss aversion evoked Ariely. The classical theory predicts that the same thing to spend 10,000 euros for something that is worth 10,100, than to spend 100 for a property that is 200. It is clear that this is not natural. If instead the introduction of the act depends on the ratio gain / expenditure plus expenditure, the greater the benefit should be important to decide to buy, which is consistent with intuition .

My hypothesis would explain the paradox the passage of the radio which I talked about in this post : it does not bother us to go to the ; other side of town to save 30 euros on a car that is 100, but you can not do the same thing to save 30 euros on buying a car (with car) worth 30,000 euros. The yield displacement is 30% in the first case but falls to 30 / 30000 = 0.1% in the second. Our instinctive reaction could not be more rational view from this angle. 30 euros and 30 euros are not equal in all circumstances!

Weber's Law in economics-Xochipilli
The best argument in favor of my hypothesis is that it is consistent with the rest of our rating system innate. We saw in this post , either for the height of sounds, the loudness (decibels), light intensity, weight, pain, pleasure, durations, number etc.. comparing two quantities by evaluating their relationship, not by measuring their difference. Our physiological system is not very sensitive to the absolute values (absolute ear for music is exceptional). According to Weber's law we perceive only relative values And we consider the sizes in proportion to each other. Strange as it may sound, our sense of proportion is natively "logarithmic". Conversely, the "subtraction" We are not natural. Addition and subtraction arithmetic recent inventions, dating back at most a few thousand years, when the rise of agriculture imposed counting pre precisely rather than roughly estimate quantities. Assume evaluate consumer preferences with the same tools as the rest of his sensations seems to me ultimately not unreasonable at all. After all Homo Sapiens Homo Economicus rest!

Sources: Dan Ariely
It's (really?) I decide (Flammarion 2008)

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always the fantasies of Homo Economicus 2 on our decisions or irrational perceptions in relation to past or future events. All our behavioral quirks become much easier to understand when one accepts the idea is perceived logarithmically times ...

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Globalization and free trade are not large ills


I have a problem with the economic radius of our libraries. They are monopolized by the tests denouncing the horrors of globalization and neo-liberalism globally. No wonder we are the world champions of liberalism, according to this survey 2005 International (click the graphic at left to enlarge).

The argument developed is almost always the same: addressing social dumping from countries like China, our economy is weighed down by high wages and an expensive welfare. Result: either we close our factories, it is cutting back on salaries and benefits in a terrible downward spiral. While it still manages to export high-tech stuff but it does not employ anyone, and least qualified to remain on the tile. In short, in return for plasma TV and DVD players cheap, globalization brings poverty, insecurity, unemployment and deficits. Nice progress!

against the current of the intellectual rebellion, I found some essays of economists I think that's sensible. They argue that globalization is mostly a convenient scapegoat that prevents us from questioning the shortcomings of our system. It deserved to go and get a closer look: zoom this week on the links between globalization, unemployment and wages. Which are not necessarily those we think.

Unemployment is it soluble in international openness?
dint of losing market share in sectors that employ the most labor, logic would dictate that rich countries with high wages can see both the trade balance deteriorated and unemployment increased. I am amused to compare the employment rates of each country's trade balance. The least we can say is that the logic [rich country => Imports = high> unemployment] does not jump to mind:

first finding the balance Business clearly has little to do with the level wages. Or rather, if one seeks a correlation, it is rather the opposite of what one would expect. The poorest European countries (Portugal, Spain) are big net importers, while the richest countries (Sweden, Netherlands, Germany) are net exporters. The same goes for developing countries (on this site example), the trade balance is very positive now (China), sometimes very negative (India).

Then, the link between unemployment levels and trade balance is far from clear. As for net exporters (right graph), the Netherlands and Norway show indeed a low unemployment rate, but this is not the case of & # 39; Germany for example. The situation is equally ambiguous for net importers (left graph): While France, Spain and Italy have higher rates of poor jobs, but the ; Australia New Zealand (and even the U.S.) had no employment problems in 2008.

Several studies have attempted to make a balance-jobs of globalization in France and their evidence is mixed: sometimes the balance is positive (between 1990 and 1997) and sometimes slightly negative (between 1997 and 2001). But in any case, the number of jobs created or destroyed is tiny, about 10 000 per year, compared with a straw 250 000 jobs lost in 2009 ...

Who said that nations were "economic war"?
The weak influence of international trade on employment is better understood when we realize how much our trade with developing countries is limited. According to the WTO , goods from poor countries (Africa, Asia, South America) does not even represent 20% of imports from the European Union in 2008 . These imports that make us so afraid represent less than 6% of European GDP. As noted economist Paul Krugman , if one were to compare two nations to Pepsi and Coca-Cola, it would have to imagine that each company makes 90% of its sales to its own employees and the remaining 10% from those of its competitor: no trivial as competitive situation!

Besides the very concept of "competitiveness of a nation" is in itself questionable: for a business is easy, its competitiveness is measured by net income. In the case of a nation, should we take the budget deficit, its growth, unemployment rate, its standard of living? And then we saw here everything a nation that mattered was offset by an exchange in the opposite direction, whether through exports, financial services or investments . Relations between nations are those customers suppliers rather as suppliers compete with each other. Finally and most importantly, the idea of an economic war between nations which evokes a fight come out winners and losers. Yet that is precisely what economists disagree: they believe international trade is anything but a zero sum game because the growth of international trade increases the size of the GA teau economy. And it's true that if we analyze the statistics of the WTO since 1950, we must recognize International Exchanges and economic growth appear to go together:

Source: WTO International Trade Statistics , 2009

there reason d & # 39; fear of low wages?
course, could there be to object, but it does not answer the question of social dumping. How do they resist our economies to unfair competition from Chinese companies, combining low wages and productivity the first world? This concern requires a country to artificially maintain her wages at a very low level. As unorthodox idea, since in theory wages and productivity are inextricably linked, but at least it is a testable hypothesis. Armed with my stats I'm comparing hourly wages and productivity in the world. That's what happens:

Above right, the most developed countries (Norway, Germany, Denmark, Netherlands, France ...) have both hourly wages and productivity high. At the other end of the scale (bottom left), Mexico, Portugal and Korea have low wages and low productivity. Roughly productivity and wages are linked even if obviously disparities (Denmark for example has a lower productivity than the United Kingdom, but higher wages).

What about the evolution in time? Again, the statistics I gleaned on the subject seemed to me conclusive. Increased productivity and higher wages are associated regardless Country:

Source: Course Philippe Martin (Ecole Polytechnique, 2004)

Developments Korea since 1970 is a good example (source here). While productivity (Expressed as a percentage of that of U.S.) increased from 14% in 1975 to 69% in 1995, its average hourly wages rose during the same period of 5 to 43% % (always expressed as% of wages in the U.S.). From my 2008 statistics, it is now 60% that of the United States.
Basically, this correlation is more logical than it looks: the standard of living of the inhabitants (= salary) increases as the country 's ; enriches (wealth Productivity = output = x number of workers) and I do not see why China would escape such a catch-up phenomenon. As it is generally more productive, their wages go back as naturally elsewhere.

is the comparative advantage that counts!
economists go even further: since the nineteenth century and ^e theory Ricardo (improved but never contradicted my knowledge) they argue that a country does not export goods in which it has improved productivity in absolute value , but those for which it has a relative advantage . It illustrates the usual theory, taking the example of two countries (England and Portugal) exchanging two goods (cloth and wine). Suppose only 10 hours, Portugal produces 20 meters of cloth and 300 liters of wine while England produced only 10 yards of cloth and 100 liters of wine. Portugal is much more efficient value absolute on both productions. Yet he has an interest in specializing in wine production and import his cloth of England (see the explanation on Wikipedia or this site for example). Each country grows rich from foreign trade by leveraging its comparative advantage, not its absolute advantages as we tend to believe.

Not very clear? OK, here's an example more intuitive widely popularized by the classical economic literature (And obviously a tad sexist): Imagine a lawyer champion keyboard. His secretary then has no absolute advantage over him: she is not a lawyer and type as fast as him. Yet the lawyer is always advisable to entrust his correspondence (unless there is another who types without blocks) because he did not have time to do everything. Each specializes in the task for which he has an advantage on and the tandem is more productive overall.

This is probably that globalization makes us evil: it requires that countries specialize where they are (relatively) soon and gradually abandon areas where they have no comparative advantage. It requires at least two drastic changes in our economic policy: it must firstly enormous efforts to help workers adversely affected sectors to retrain, Pluto , t wade that maintain their activity in broad strokes / cost of subsidies. Then, the state must give up its independence in certain economic areas such as agriculture, fisheries and certain strategic industries. For a country like France, it means giving up part of our cultural exception. Not easy to accept ...

Sources: Some excellent essays
economy: The economy without taboos Joseph Heath, Our economic phobias (author of the blog econoclaste ) Unemployment fate or necessity? of Cahuc and Zylberberg, France is unfair of Timothy Smith. Two tickets
Paul Krugman ( here and there )
Does Trade with Low Wages Hurt American Workers? Stephen Golub
Statistics 2010 Bureau of Labor Statistics

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Cascade Electric, waterfalls evolutionary

If like me, you imagine an electric generator to necessarily like a kind of gas works, full of turbines, which turn tricks, magnets or chemical reagents, I invite you to take a look at one's Lord Kelvin invented in 1857. It is simply water that flows gently into metal containers after passing through metal tubes equally immobile

(source of the photo here )

Well, you do not risk the electric shock, but this funny marchin water still manages to give birth to beautiful spark, check out:


Magic? Not at all, the same principle is surprisingly simple. The two metal containers and tubing also normally neutral. But there's always one that is very lightly loaded. Suppose it is the right vessel and left tube that is positively charged:

In the drop being formed, there are few charged particles (ions). Not many, only one molecule in 10 million (10 -7 ) when the water is pure and neutral pH, but enough to trigger the phenomenon. Negative ions (OH-) present in water are attracted to the positively charged tube. When the water drop falls into the container left, it carries with it the negative ions. The vessel left charging and therefore undermines the right tube in contact as well.

This time, the right tube attracts the positive ions (H30 +) of water over him and drops that fall on the right are positively charged. The right container is positively charged and in contact with the left tube as well. A cycle begins and gradually increasing the difference in costs between the two containers until the voltage causes an electric shock.

A As the unit is charging, the jet splashed more and more about him and the droplets trajectories increasingly bizarre as to defy gravity!


Again, it is logical: the charged droplets are attracted to the tube (opposite charge) and added to the electrostatic force gravity. Very small droplets eventually just follow the lines of electrostatic fields

source: here

If a drop hits the tube that attracts, it unloads a bit: this phenomenon (among others) that limits the power of this type of electrostatic assembly ...

The simplicity of the assembly is impressive, but what fascinates me most is the spontaneous breaking of symmetry in the assembly. In the initial state the two containers are indistinguishable while at the end is one of the two positively charged without being able to predict which one. The waterfall (balanced) causes a cascade electrostatic totally asymmetrical.

one cascade to another ...
This cascade-breaker-of-symmetry reminds me of the enigma of 'homochirality of life ": the first Pasteur discovered that all the amino acids in living matter have the same configuration right propeller (like a corkscrew right-handed). Yet when synthesized in the laboratory these molecules, we obtain in general two types of propellers in equal amounts. This discovery made by Chance is fundamental because it marks the boundary between the living world and that of the inert in the living world there is only one size organic molecule from the two possible.

artificial molecules have yet exactly the same chemical properties in terms of density, melting point, etc.: why on earth is there only one configuration in nature? The mystery is far from being solved and the literature abounds with hypotheses from simple to more complicated (some refer to the spontaneous breaking of CP symmetry of weak interactions or to the effect of space radiation ).

One thing is certain living organisms, each made up of amino acids in helix only right, react differently to the two molecules format. Pastor had noticed for example that only the natural form of tartaric acid was digested by micro-organisms. We know he is with the molecule of vitamin C. Aspartame is sweet, but his twin mirror has a bitter taste. One could multiply examples infinity.

Shapes left (S, teratogenic) and right (R, sedative) of thalidomide (source CNRS)

This second discovery inspired him to Pastor a simple explanation for the strange consistent patterns of living: our living world would operate as a gigantic factory screws and nuts, which only the parts having the same meaning threads are compatible.

Although both types of molecular configuration may have existed in the original soup of life, the machine Kelvin can get an idea of who was able to move to the origin of life: just as the generator of water, a small imbalance between the proportions of the two types of molecules could trigger a cascade effect evolutionary resulting in the complete disappearance of one of two forms.
If this hypothesis is correct, do not look for special cause the propeller to the right, any more than we should seek to understand why this is the right vessel at one point that is positively charged in Kelvin's machine. Both types of physical stunts, and scalable break the symmetry original way that is both inevitable and unpredictable.

Oh by the way, I just realize that the term "chirality" (the property of a molecule can exist in two forms mirror each other) was just invented by Kelvin ...

Sources:
MIT Course 02.08 Walter Lewin on electromagnetism, a model of pedagogy!
The Ambidextrous Universe by Martin Gardner
An excellent summary of John Philibert on symmetry in nature ( pdf)

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Physical laws: 1 Bees: 0

The extraordinary regularity of honeycomb is one of the natural wonders that has most excited minds. For example, the mathematician Pappus of Alexandria had noticed soon Antiquity that these hexagonal structures allowed the bees to develop the maximum cells for a minimum of wax. In this day of return, that's enough to make jealous crabs in math. How these little beasts without two grams of brains they can develop as optimal as they are elegant buildings? Two thousand years later, the false explanations were always die hard ...


A little geometry to start (I promise: no equation!)
You are a bee and you must make a maximum of cells of wax for receiving larvae. To not be jealous, all the cells must have the same surface. What format did you interest in choosing to consume the least possible wax? If you lack imagination and you only use polygons, you only have three choices: the equilateral triangle, square and hexagon. All other polygons will leave "holes" between them when you stick it to each other.
Use less wax can look back to the form which gives the largest area for a given perimeter. Now more sides a polygon has, the more surface is large (at constant perimeter): It seems logical, since its shape approximates more and more that of a circle that is precisely the figure of largest area. Of the three possible
polygons (triangle, square, hexagon), so this is the hexagon that can make the most of cells with less wax. Skeptics can check this with the formula it offers the best surface on the perimeter.

Well all this reasoning is pretty good but there is no reason to consider only polygons, dammit! Why not more funny shapes, like those Escher imaginative example:

Could it be that some of these figures are used to "pave" the most economical plan? It feels good not, but it incredibly hard to prove. This conjecture honeycomb which enshrines the regular hexagon as the champion of the paving had to wait more than 2300 years before being rigorously demonstrated in 1999!


divine work or effect of natural selection?
How not see evidence of God's intervention in this beautiful optimality? "The bees, and inspiration by the divine will, are capable of applying blindly the finest math," wrote the scientist Fontenelle the seventeenth century . For Kepler bees "are endowed with a soul and thus capable of making the geometry". Even Jean-Henri Fabre , the pope of the modern entomology, referred in their goals all rational attempts to explain: "In his books, he wrote , the Creative Power always geometrizes ( ...) Plato said. There is really solving the problem of Wasps. " Even today, honeycombs inspire all sorts of mystical explanations ( here or there example).

The argument was so powerful that divine Darwin himself has long studied the subject in the Origin of Species . He was annoyed because apart from these hexagonal structures, not found in wasps and bees that cylindrical cavities more or less coarse, especially for solitary species. How could she bee "learn" to make hexagons from cylinders? Obviously he has sought the response of the side of natural selection (p. 304 ):

Thus, in my opinion, the most surprising of all known instincts, that of the bee, can be explained by the action of natural selection. Selection Nature has taken advantage of the slight modifications, and many successive suffered by the instincts of a more simple then it has gradually brought the bee to describe more fully and more regularly spheres placed in two rows at equal distances, and widen and raise the flat walls on the lines of intersection. It goes without saying that the bees do not know more than they describe their spheres at a distance from each other, they know what it is that the various sides of a hexagonal prism of his or lozenges basis. The determinant of the action of natural selection was building strong cells, the shape and capability to contain larvae, achieved with the minimum expenditure of wax and work. The swarm individual who has built the most perfect cell with any work and any expenditure is made into honey wax is the most successful, and sent its newly acquired economical instincts to successive swarms in turn also have had more chances in their favor in the struggle for existence.

not know anything about math, the bees would be (through trial and error? Theory does not say) falling by chance on an optimal structure giving them an economy of wax decisive for their survival and multiplication in greater numbers. This explanation was so successful that the honeycombs have changed sides ideological argument divine they became the classic illustration of the dramatic effects of natural selection, which is found on most sites dealing with the question ( here or there example).

A purely mechanical explanation?
Yet there is one obvious problem with the Darwinian explanation: it is unprovable. Why imagine too convoluted stories, fulminated D'Arcy Thompson (which I mentioned in this post or it ) while the hexagonal honeycombs can be explained by the simple laws of physics? Enjoy the last beautiful days to watch the foam of your beer, you'll see that pressed against each other, the bubbles are also adopting a more or less hexagonal (right diagram, source here).

In two dimensions, the mechanism is simple to understand (left): Initially each bubble is circular and its neighbors in six key points. Under the effect of pressure, the six contact points are transformed into six straight lines and circles change into hexagons tight against each other

When one is in three dimensions, things are a little more complicated because you can only pave a curved surface with hexagons. This explains the somewhat quirky form bubbles in beer foam alternating hexagons and pentagons, like a football.

We find these hexagonal shapes everywhere in nature, as soon as disks, spheres or cylinders are compressed against each other. Try for example with egg yolks in a dish:

When the cylinders are molten magma which press against each Other cooling, it gives these extraordinary formations of Giant's Causeway in Ireland:

(source: here )

In the area of living, networks of hexagons appear whenever a large number cells in round-gate crowd against each other under the effect of growth. Here, it's not a honeycomb cells but the eye of the American horsefly. The hexagons are irregular because the surface of the eye is spherical

(source here )

same explanation for the beautiful geometry of some diatoms. The vesicles that are soft in the form of hexagons when larger. Silica accumulates in the walls between the vesicles and eventually form a rigid skeleton finely meshed:

.

(source here )

There are plenty of examples like this in all areas of chemistry and biology at all scales, from molecules to the hexagon Saturn .

How bee it take?
Could it be that the nests of bees owe their beauty or the genius of bees, or the hand of God, or even natural selection, but to simple mechanical effects on pockets of soft wax? The idea is not new: already in the seventeenth century, Erasmus Bartholin , a Danish mathematician doubted that research economy is behind those pretty patterns. He proposed that the hexagonal cells was simply the result of the effort of each bee to enlarge up the cell constructs, by analogy with the pressure in each bubble. Besides, the bees wax is initially very fluid, just as a soapy film. This hypothesis would explain why the hexagonal shape of cells is between the cells and not on the edge of the nest. I saw myself this summer on a nest of wasps in training (that would not we do for science!) That the outer walls are shaped arc, exactly as predicted by the Bartholin hypothesis:

If Darwin was right, the bees have been selected for their ability to build flat walls everywhere, including on the edges.

Good, but can still be skeptical about the hypothesis "of bees that grow." How intermittent efforts as those of bees on the cells they can also lead to regular buildings? D'Arcy Thompson has a much simpler explanation (p133): "It seems much more probable it is in reality a question of power: the walls actually adopt their configuration when they are in a state semi-fluid, due to the presence of residual water in the pulp plant, or under the effect of softening the wax caused by the heat generated by all the bees at work in the hive. " D'Arcy too strong: in 2004 researchers seem to give reason for artificially recreating the hexagonal structure of a honeycomb without bees, by simply casting a liquid wax hot rolls around and tight against each other (which include bees in real life). It would therefore simply the bees to spread the liquid wax around them so that it will eventually take the form of hexagons almost perfect under the sole effect of physical laws:

And the optimum wax, that is he?
Opposite to these results, the hypothesis of natural selection of thrifty bees wax it still holds the road? The researchers of that study (( The amazing bee , P175) "if one were to include in computing the hem of wax that covers the edge of the cells, the 30% wax would negate any additional balance sheet optimization. D Moreover, as noted by D'Arcy Thompson (p 131), "the bee is not sparing of his work, it is not only the fineness or accuracy sufficient for it to take advantage of a any wax economy by building its socket according to these theoretical standards (...) When a bee built an isolated cell or a small group of cells destined to give rise to eggs queens, the building is of poor quality. The alveoli are the queens of small clusters of crude wax, where the cavity is barely sketched sharp blows of jaws, like a roughly hewn tree trunk that bore traces of a blunt tool. "

Natural selection therefore clearly has not selected specimens of bees wax more efficient. However, when one thinks of the energy they need to spend to produce all the wax, how to imagine that parsimony has played no role in the evolution of bees? I wonder if we should not reverse outright the argument of the classical natural selection. Is the need to make full backing of nests, which have developed in bees the instinct to save money? Or would it not rather the economy of wax that provides a mechanically collective nest would have favored the evolutionary success of social species?

Basically, all this is rather reassuring: the bees are not math geniuses, or the fierce economic and physical laws are probably sufficient to explain their prodigious constructions. Natural selection would play a role well, but not necessarily the one usually depicted. One thing is puzzling in this story: why, despite its inconsistencies and its unverifiable nature, the hypothesis of natural selection of thrifty bees wax it is still widespread, including in books or scientific sites? And conversely why do we find as little mechanical explanation for these structures, however, former explanation, consistent, backed by experience and in line with comparable phenomena in other areas? I suppose that such an explanation is difficult to popularize because it contradicts the representation of classical Darwinian evolution and because it is underpinned by any more comprehensive theory, mechanics this time of evolution. "You Can not Beat Something With Nothing", in science as elsewhere.

Sources:
This blog post General Knowledge
This article Science News on the conjecture of the honeycomb and the other the University of Montreal. This site
on diatoms and it on the hexagon in nature. And of course
Growth and Form by D'Arcy Thompson ...

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PS. We also attempted to explain the shape of the bottom of the cells (right, source Wikipedia ) by arguments of economy of wax. The cells are stacked into each other in several layers and each is closed by three planar faces (called rhombs) that join, as a hexagonal pencil, the point would be cut by three strokes of the knife (left figure). This form allows cells to fit perfectly into each other. It is certainly more efficient than a flat-bottomed hexagonal wax, but in 1964 the Hungarian mathematician Fejes Toth proved that it is less a background consisting of two hexagons and two smaller diamonds (right diagram). This is played very little (the economy would be only 0.35%) but why natural selection would she despised that little optimization? researchers wanted to test an artificial if they could bring about a This form only by the laws of physics. In trapping bubbles between glass plates, they got two layers of hexagonal cells and observed how they fit into one another. Bingo! Depending on the amount of trapped liquid, the substance of these cells was sometimes that of three rhombs, sometimes described by Toth. Certainly, the physical mechanisms are far from clear and material saving is not the only variable.