A male bee has only one parent( a mother) and a female bee has two parents(a mother and father). Assuming all ancestors are distinct, how many great, great, great, great grandparents does a male bee have.
To determine the number of great, great, great, great grandparents a male bee has, we can break down the generations.
Let's start with the male bee (we will call him Bee A) and count the generations backwards:
1. The male bee (Bee A) has two parents (mother and father).
2. The parents of Bee A are one generation back and they are the starting point for the second great.
3. Each parent of Bee A had two parents of their own (one mother and one father). So, for the third great, we multiply by 2.
4. We continue this pattern for each preceding generation, multiplying by 2 each time until we reach the desired generation.
Based on this pattern, we can calculate the number of great, great, great, great grandparents for Bee A as follows:
1 (Bee A's parents) * 2^n (where n is the number of "greats" - in this case, 4 greats)
1 * 2^4 = 1 * 16 = 16
Therefore, a male bee (Bee A) has 16 great, great, great, great grandparents.