• jan teli
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    8 months ago

    Whose idea was this?
    Who paid for it?

    • @Carrolade
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      78 months ago

      Probably nobody. Study like this wouldn’t cost much, you’d just be reviewing footage of penguins looking for them to shit. Easy way to get an authorship credit.

      My guess anyway, I haven’t actually checked the methodology.

      • @[email protected]
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        158 months ago

        Looks like it was a follow up to someone asking an entertaining question during a lecture, which is the best reason to do some science!

        According to Victor Benno Meyer-Rochow of the Research Institute of Luminous Organisms in Japan, a co-author of the original 2003 paper, these fecal findings all started with an expedition he led to Antarctica. Although he was collecting samples of local marine worms and tiny terrestrial insects called springworms for further study, he also took copious photographs of the many penguins in the region, which he used in his lectures. During a seminar at Kitasato University in Japan, a young woman asked about a slide showing a penguin brooding on its nest, wondering about the white and pink lines radiating outward. She interpreted them as “decoration” and asked how the penguins made them.

        “I explained that a penguin stands up, moves to the edge of its nest, turns around, lifts its tail, and then shoots from its rear, which leaves a 30-40 cm long streak of semi-liquid whitish stuff behind,” Meyer-Rochow wrote in a 2019 blog post. “Everybody laughed—with the exception of the questioner. She got red in her face and quietly sat down.” (The color of the feces depends on the penguin’s diet: if primarily fish, the poop is white. If the penguin has been feasting on krill, the poop takes on a pinkish hue.)

      • Tar_Alcaran
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        8 months ago

        Someone measured enough penguins to find the average buttholecloaca size though. I would NOT do that for free…

        • @Carrolade
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          58 months ago

          Basic animal physiology for common animals is pretty well nailed down, I presume you could look that up. We probably also know how big their internal organs are, on average, just as an example.

          Also note, for free vs no reward are not the same. Being cited as an author of something, anything, is important for advancement and recognition in your field. Students seldom get much financial compensation for the research necessary to graduate, for instance.

          That said, I’m guessing. I am not in biology or any of its offshoots.

          • swab148
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            38 months ago

            This guy was all about biology and it’s offshoots!

    • @mumblerfish
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      18 months ago

      They at least thank the “New Zealand Universiy Grant Committee”, so them maybe?

  • go $fsck yourself
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    108 months ago

    Why “Pooh”? It’s not a bear. Why not “defecate”?

    • @stockRot
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      58 months ago

      It’s alliteration. If you continued reading, you can see that they have a much more professional title right underneath

        • @stockRot
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          08 months ago

          “pooh”, uncapitalized, as the title is if you read it, can also mean excrement informally.