Johann Grolle

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“We Studied Duck Sex Intensively”

June 16, 2017 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

Ducklings, like the babies of pretty much any species, are adorable. Full-grown ducks seem to me to be kind of assholes. Not killing machines like owls or heartless predators like vultures, but irritating. Always quacking. Fuck off. I don’t care for the attitude.

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Louis CK, also sort of an asshole, has spoken of duck genitalia: “I’ve heard that ducks have one hole, and they pee out of it, and they shit out of it, they get fucked in it, and they lay eggs out of it. That has got to be one dirty, smelly hole.” That being said, Louis still seems far pervier.

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In a fascinating Spiegel Q&A, Johann Grolle questions ornithologist Richard Prum about duck copulation, a process that sounds like a nightmare. The opening (so to speak):

Spiegel:

Professor Prum, among all the wonders of nature you were most inspired by the sex of ducks. Why?

Richard Prum:

For a long time, I have been fascinated by the sex life of birds. But there is probably no other species where the deep sexual conflict between male and female sex is as blatant as in ducks.

Spiegel:

And so you started studying their genitalia?

Richard Prum:

No, it was actually even more simple than that. I had a prospective post-doctoral student who was looking for something to do, and she was interested in studying genitalia. I said to myself: Well, I have never worked on that end of the bird before. As a result, we studied duck sex intensively for six, seven years.

Spiegel:

What surprised you most?

Richard Prum:

Oh, there were many surprises. Not the least that we had all these descriptions of duck genitalia, and when we looked ourselves, we said: There is almost nothing to see. How could this be? That is how we discovered that the genitalia of ducks regress and regrow each year, so that a 10- or 15-centimeter penis in the summer will reduce to less than 1 centimeter in the winter and then grow back the next year.

Spiegel:

This is part of the sexual conflict you mentioned before? 

Richard Prum:

Yes, indeed. Mate choice occurs first. In winter the males do these elaborate displays, and the females choose the one they like most. Because, parallel to the evolution of the males’ display behavior, the females have evolved preferences for these displays. We call this “coevolution.”

Spiegel:

So far, this sounds quite harmonious.

Richard Prum:

Yes, it is. The pairs stay together until the clutch is laid and the females incubate. The conflict part comes next. Because now some of the males pursue an alternative mating strategy, which is to violently enforce copulation. For this they make use of their penis, which is regrown by now. This penis is a very bizarre structure. It is counterclockwise coiled, and erection takes place in less than half a second. Erection, penetration and ejaculation in ducks is one and the same event, and it happens very, very rapidly.

Spiegel:

How do the females react?

Richard Prum:

It’s very interesting.•

“A huge barrel of fucking duck vaginas.”

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“Evil Is Something That Only Humans Are Capable Of”

October 8, 2015 in Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

Because of the knowledge they’ve acquired and the many unique experiences they’ve known, some people are a loss to the culture that can’t be replaced when they die. It just becomes a hole where something useful was. Pete Seeger was like that, someone who knew the Great Depression, the Civil Rights Movement, HUAC, etc. He was steadfastly on hand for all the major American movements until he wasn’t anymore. 

Jane Goodall is that kind of person, too, though thankfully she’s still alive. What a sensational, uncommon life. The primatologist sat for an interview with Philip Bethge and Johann Grolle of Spiegel discussing her conservation efforts, the refugee crisis in Europe and the sometimes atrocious behavior of chimps (and humans). An excerpt about the latter topic:

Spiegel:

Chimps can have a very dark side as well. Did it come as a shock to you when you first became aware of it?

Jane Goodall:

Absolutely! It was horrifying. First, we observed this brutal attack on a female which ended in the killing of her baby. Chimps are brutal, and it is so deliberate. The males go out and get near the boundary of their territory. And they walk very silently trying hard not to make any noise. They will climb into a tree and stare out over hostile territory for hours. They are waiting for the right opportunity. And then they attack.

Spiegel:

Is this comparable to warfare?

Jane Goodall:

It can be. We observed what I call the four-year war. It all started when a big chimp community split into two because there were too many males. About seven males left with some females and babies. However, they didn’t go beyond the range which previously they shared but took up the southern part of it. When relations got completely cold between the two groups, the original group began systematically moving back into the territory they had lost.

Spiegel:

Killing the others?

Jane Goodall:

Yes, every single one. We observed six murders ourselves, and circumstantial evidence showed that the same thing happened to the seventh male. It was horrible.

Spiegel:

Are they intentionally cruel? Do they want to inflict pain?

Jane Goodall:

I thought about this a lot. But I came to the conclusion that being evil is something that only humans are capable of. A chimp would never plan to pull another’s nails out. The chimps’ way of aggression is quick and brutal. I compare them to gang attacks.

Spiegel:

Do you think the chimpanzees’ emotional world is comparable to ours?

Jane Goodall:

In many ways, yes.•

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“Our World Is Different”

August 21, 2015 in Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

The Nobel Physicist Frank Wilczek, author of A Beautiful Question, thinks CERN may soon go a long way beyond the discovery of the Higgs-Boson particle and prove supersymmetry. In a Spiegel Q&A conducted by Johann Grolle, the scientist also explains what the consistency of natural laws says to him:

Spiegel:

Are you astonished that nature obeys laws that we humans are able to understand?

Frank Wilczek:

This fact has deep meaning, and is not at all guaranteed. As a thought experiment, let us assume that the whole world is just a simulation on a gigantic supercomputer, where we are also just part of this simulation. So, roughly speaking, we are talking about a world in which Super Mario thinks that his Super Mario world is real. The laws in such a world wouldn’t necessarily be beautiful or symmetric. They would be whatever the programmer put in there, which means these laws could be arbitrary, they could suddenly change or be different from place to place. And there would be no simpler description of these laws than a very long computer program. Such a world is logically possible, but our world is different. It is a glorious fact that in our world, when we go really deep, we can understand it.•

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