Suppressed for a hundred years: report of shocking sexual deviance among penguins

Alessandra Kelley

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... Well, not quite.

Doctor George Murray Levick, a researcher who accompanied Scott to the Antarctic certainly thought the sexual practices he observed were "depraved" when he studied adélie penguins at Cape Adare during the summer of 1911-1912.

According to the BBC, Dr. Levick was so horrified at what he saw that although the rest of his notes were in English, he wrote his observations on breeding habits in Greek, and they were left out of his groundbreaking paper on the natural history of the adélie penguin, published in 1914.

But 100 copies of the notes were secretly made and discreetly circulated among select scientists by the keeper of zoology at the Natural History Museum, Sidney Harmer, and two copies survived to the present, prominently marked "NOT FOR PUBLICATION."

The paper was rediscovered recently, and Dr. Levick's observations reexamined.

Modern biologists say that the behavior Dr. Levick mistook for deviancy was due to simple inexperience and instincts. The adélie penguin breeding season is extremely short and the inexperienced young adult penguins throw themselves into it with energy and experimentation, apparently trying, well, anything that might work.

Looking at the penguins as if they were humans from Edwardian England, Dr. Levick saw coercion, chick molestation, necrophilia, and homosexuality.

But adélie penguins are not humans. Modern biologists point out they are birds with a very short window of opportunity for breeding, a species that needs to be energetic and opportunistic during that brief window in order to produce enough chicks to continue, even if that includes doing things that if viewed through an anthropomorphic lens horrify and offend Edwardian Englishmen.

It is fortunate that Dr. Levick's research was uncovered, and rather a pity that an inability to see animals outside of a human context locked up a vital part of Dr. Levick's research for a century.
 

regdog

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Oh for the love of...
 

regdog

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Were you referring to the cheesy, sensationalistic nature of my post, or to the inappropriate prudery that suppressed important research?

The inappropriate prudery that suppressed important research.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, there is no bottom to the abyss of stupid.
 

ElaineA

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Well you certainly know how to title a post! :roll:

Actually, having been obsessed with penguins since I read Mr. Popper's Penguins in fourth grade, I am simultaneously amused by the imagery of the poor "teenage" penguins going for it with anything prone, and saddened that the account was suppressed even in the scientific community. Levick survived that ordeal, witnessed something groundbreaking and we're only now seeing his observations. Still, better late than never. Thanks for posting the links! :)