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Do Penguins Topple When Planes Fly Over?
dannyspanner was among the teeming masses to point out that: "The BBC has a short story about some research that will be carried out to see if penguin colonies fall over when aircraft fly overhead. I hope they get some footage if they prove it's true ..." I secretly believe that news outlets like stories like this because penguins look so comical already -- thinking of them rolling around like duckpins (rather than the ultra-coordinated hero of Tuxracer) makes everybody laugh.
WTF is Tuxracer? That link doesn't work.
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/bin/fortune | slashdotsig.sh
I've seen little kids do it... if they can, why not a pinguin?
Too true! The Australian Air Force pilots were all reprimanded several years ago for doing exactly this while out flying sorties over antarctica. Huge colonies of penguins were left scarred for life.
Is that an African or European swallow?
It's www.tuxracer.com, foo.
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Its true - I've even seen people jump for cover when planes fly overhead, especially in Kosovo. A cassette bomb over a refugee column will always make people fly for cover.
Revolution = Evolution
I can remember an old "Outland" cartoon, feat. Opus the penguin telling a story about how the most silly sight on earth: was "4000 penguins staring at the sky, watching the planes go left, right and slowly 4000 penguins falled on their backs when the planes flew overhead." This was in 1985 or something...
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
A non-borken link to Tuxracer: http://tuxracer.sourceforge.net ;
Information doesn't want to be anthropomorphized. -AC
Gary larson must have been right about cows having cocktail parties until cars show up.
I am !amused.
I bet they like stories like this so they get posted on Linux fanatic metanews sites
--www.mp3.com/kruhft--
You can't read this story without watching the BBC's animated GIF that was linked to it earlier today...
i ns_supuf.gif
http:// new s.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/1000000/images/_1003469_pengu
Pablo Nevares, "the freshmaker".
Pablo Nevares, "the freshmaker".
That reminds me of a sociological reasearch that concluded the amazing fact that 50% of divorcees in Israel's kibutz are women.
I assume that somewhere in late October scientists with unused annual grants panick. There should be a journal for such researh:
how about:
THe Journal of "Pure" Science
international Sqanderer
Laughingstock Quarterly
Eyebrow Raiser Almanac
-- look, cheese ahoy!
Penguins topple when BSD users sneeze.
I vote to establish "no-fly zones" over penguin colonies, as I don't want to disturb the cute little buggers
Tuxracer. Kinda like the sound of that. Tuxracer. Tuxracer.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I don't know if it was the reporter desparately seeking an interesting "angle" on the story or the scientician being interviewed who wanted a mention for the project, but it seems like the experiment is focused more on behavioural effects.
I doubt anybody would spend money on RN Helicopter time to see if penguins fall over watching aircraft... it's just a tease for the public. The real value would be determining what changes in behaviour are induced by loud, low-flying aircraft.
They say they are concerned that the penguins' ability to reproduce might be affected. Wouldn't yours? Kind of a no-brainer. What a waste of money.
Only those who dream can grasp reality.
And who just came up with that idea?
Sounds like they're just trying to prove a myth. Doesn't mean its wrong, just funny that's the first thing they can think of when they think of disrupting behavior.
This urban legend surfaces from time to time. It is debunked here
Reality has a liberal bias
I once spoke with one of my father's friends when I was visiting him, and she told me that when she was stopping over in the Falklands on her way to Antartica, and she told me that one of the most amazing things that she ever saw was when thousands of penguins fell over when watching harriers on manuvers. I remember that a few years back about some enviromentalists went down there and threw a hissy fit about it all. I don't remember what came about of it.
If you read the article, their talking about how it could be causing problems with the penguins, yet, their going to do fly over repeatedly to find out for sure. So if it does cause problems, their just going to be making it worse.
Now, if it does cause problems, how are they going to handle it. Would they try to make a no flying zone over penguins like they have for the whitehouse?
Why are they doing the test with helicopters?
Everyone knows that the penguins did their vertical rotation when a British pilot did a slow flyover in a Harrier jet. Who wouldn't watch?
I've seen it happen with people at the beach (Savannah, GA) watching a F4 Phantom do a low and slow overhead. Plane flys left to right, flys out over the ocean, flys back inland, people look up, flop over. But, no one looks up to see a helicopter.
Even better, why don't they try it with a B52 skimming the waves like in the days of SAC flying 24x7? That'll get their attention. Especially those savvy penguins that know what the payload is.
Or, do they want this test to fail? Helicopters are just annoying. Penguins won't be interested in looking up for that. To reproduce the results, one must reproduce the conditions.
http://www.urbanlegends.com/animals/penguins_fall_ over.html
With a explanation what really happens when fighter jets fly over a penguin colony...
This is the definitive site for debunking urban legends...
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
I remember reading a "Bloom County" cartoon about this a long time ago with Opus speaking of the phenomenom as a comparison to smoking...and how even if a million people do it, it is still a stupid thing (referring to the millions of penguins that fall over) I always sorta thought that Bloome County was the official Linux cartoon.....
The anti-salmon
This does not happen.. you (and the BBC) have all been the victims of a e-mail hoax. Next time, check Snopes.com before posting anything. ever.
Liebe, Livre, Libre.
See the article here.
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"Defenestration" is to throw out of a window; what's a word for throwing 'Windows' out of something?
From: snyary@life.timeinc.com (Sasha Nyary )
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Penguins in the Falklands
Date: Tue, 25 Feb 1997 18:06:13 -0500
I didn't see this on the UL Website, and I don't read this newsgroup often, so forgive me if this story is an old one. I recently got taken in by it and thought it was worth sharing. It's a great yarn -- too bad it's not true.
Here's the story, followed by the rebuttal:
Penguins and Pilots (supposedly from the Audubon Society magazine)
A Mexican newspaper reports that bored Royal Air Force pilots stationed on the Falkland Islands have devised what they consider a marvelous new game. Noting that the local penguins are fascinated by airplanes, the pilots search out a beach where the birds are gathered and fly slowly along it at the water's edge. Perhaps ten thousand penguins turn their heads in unison watching the planes go by, and when the pilots turn around and fly back, the birds turn their heads in the opposite direction, like spectators at a slow-motion tennis match. Then, the paper reports, "The pilots fly out to sea and return directly toward the penguin colony and over-fly it. Heads go up, up, up, and ten thousand penguins fall over gently onto their backs."
Captain Claire Lucas, RAF public relations officer in the Falkland Islands:
According to Captain Lucas, who laughed and said this is a great story but not true, this is one of those legendary tales that gets passed around and resurfaces periodically. She's heard the story before. She says the Penguins actually hate the noise and scatter as the planes approach the beach.
LeoC - posting as an AC because /. doesn't let me login anymore.
why can't I login properly except from the machine holding my cookie?
--
Also knew someone who died when HMS Sheffield sank out there:( Just bought back the memory:(
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If it was the MSN butterfly instead of the Linux penguin, would we care?
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
"There is a suggestion that the birds will increase their movement when they get flown over at a low height. This can make them run away and could obviously endanger their eggs."
I wonder how much grant money it took to figure that out....
AdFuel
..Next time you are near penguins.. (for most of us that'd be at your friendly neighborhood zoo) Try reflecting some sunlight off of your watch or a small mirror - Its like remote control, the penguins will follow the spot of light wherever it goes.. Perhaps it looks like a tasty flashing fish. Whatever the reason, I wouldn't find it hard to believe that they would be as mesmerized by a jet flying overhead.
air and light and time and space
There is(was?) an American Airbase in Christchurch, New Zealand called ""deep freeze"".
From this base missions are sent to Antarctica.
Many years ago I read an article stating that the flight paths over the ice shelves had to be changed after many many peguins toppled after watching an aircraft fly directly over-head.
The truly funny part of the article was the mentioning of the need for people to travel to the penguins to help them back onto their feet.
I had a SIG once... it was years ago.
Try:
http://tuxracer.sourceforge.net/
You've forgot your password. Don't worry, it happens to a lot of people, including me :-)
Johan V.
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
I recall that I heard stories about this a year or two ago. If I remember correctly the stories were from British pilots in the Falklands. When the pilots would fly in from sea, the penguins would watch them and fall over backwards trying to follow the planes.
I thought that there was video of it occuring, but I could be mistaken on that point.
are you kidding! thats awesome! penguins rule! penguins would make a better government than we have now. they have more common sense. i mean god all they do is screw and slide down the ice. i want to be one.. sigh.. the limitations of bioengineering
- yezzz, my name is a joke.
Of course borken is a word. The Swedish Chef used it all the time- "Hordy de-dordy-dordy bork bork bork bork!" Sum moor chokol-ate fer de moo-se!
Looks like somebody just hit up the UK government for a grant to study something that doesn't really happen, and they just rubber-stamped it.
Hey, I heard that schools of fish in Tahiti keel over in droves whenever somebody on land farts! Seriously! I heard it on the Internet, so it must be true!
Quick, let's get our proposal ready and go down there!
Carousel is a lie!
It was pretty much supersceded by the Annals of Improbable Research . They're the folks responsible for the Ig Noble awards.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
-- flossie
http telnet
flossie
Write now. Defend liberty
This stuff isn't new. Haven't you seen this before in your fortune cookies? Go run: /usr/games/fortune -m "penguin"
Banu
i dont mean to be overly critical, but... your observation (albeit interesting), lacks attendance to unscientific biases. i suppose the corollary to the postulate you present is: the control to an experiment attempting to disprove (or at the very least expose) the logical hypocrisy of the hypothesis suggested at by the above is -- ahem -- to gather some animals that do indeed 'think on their own' and subject them to the same conditions as the penguins. and see what happens.
Check out the work of the debian project on this it does indeed boot and you can't logically deny that.
Respond to s
If the penguins do fall over, are they going to run the results of their reasearch through ksymoops to find out why ?
I mean unless they get massive concussions they should be fine. What does this accomplish?
Respond to s
So why is that such a big deal? Who cares if a couple of penguins fall over due to the odd passing plane? They live in such remote locations, the small amount of air traffic surely has minimal ecological impact. The problem is, places where penguins congregate are rapidly becoming commercially viable tourism destinations. There are a number of commercial airlines operating regular flights over the antarctic for example. The increase in air traffic may well pose an ecological threat, even if they don't land. The research is directly trying to ascertain whether or not we should place limits on such commercial activity.
All we have to go on at the moment is rumour, labelled by some here as urban myth. The tourism industry certainly won't take any notice of that sort of thing. What they might pay attention to is rigorous scientific evidence which points to the ecological impact of tourist activities in these fairly fragile environments. God knows they probably won't even take notice of that (eg tobacco industry's relationship with the scientific community), but it at least provides grounds for governments to put in place regulations. The situation we have at the moment, of conjecture and rumour, does not allow for any of that to happen. Who knows? We might even find out that there are no grounds to the speculation at all - I wouldn't mind taking a holiday to Antarctica...
that it was either the BBC taken in by the hoax or the "researchers" mentioned by the BBC that were taken in. i think that the more interesting possibility is the researchers having been taken in. discuss.
This research will save the world! It's of paramount importance that the penguin toppling argument be solved as soon as possible! ---
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
penguin behavior - and its underwhelming impact - was covered in a very old issue of develop at apple - can't find it online - i'll try and get the paper version in the office tomorrow... the gist was how to catch a penguin - two methods were preferred (1) place three boom boxes and an open cage on each of four sides of the birds. play walrus sounds thru the boomboxes. wait not very long for the ensuing instinctual response. close cage. or (2) chase them - when they run, their feet heat up (you can't sweat thru feathers), stop chasing, and they stop, their warm feet temporarily melt the ice then refreeze, and poof. they're stuck. get a thermos of warm water and just go pick'em up.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Whenever I hear a story like this, I always get the straight poop from snopes!
--- Speaking only for myself,
but I have experimentally confirmed that penguins fall over when you pass over them with a skidoo.
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Everyone knows this report was relased to make fun of linux and get back at the community for that fake letter for bill gates. they are trying to discredit the Linux community!
Oh wait, I guess I'm getting alittle to into politics these days... I better lay off the coffee
(note to people reading this... this was ment as comedy, dense people need not reply)
i got a link to this mailed to me 3-4 days ago, different news site, but still, same story!!!!!
--
Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know when your gonna get food poisoning.
I visited some penguin colonies on the Antarctic penisula over christmas 1998. Penguins are often portrayed as awkward and clumsy but seeing them in *that* environment is something else - they swim at about 15-20 knots and are just by far the most widespread of all the creatures down there.
Anyway some of the colonies were about 50000+ birds, just a huge crown of penguins. It was chick hatching season, and all the birds were sitting on their eggs/chicks. When skuas (agressive antarctic bird of prey - huge attitudes) swooped over the colony all the nesting penguins would crouch over their eggs and young like a mexican wave.
They'd probably do the same for planes.
:wq
"Aww, he's no fun ... he fell right over!"
Well, there is a slightly better debunking in
the 'Debunked here too' message, but if you
believe the original one, then you're just as
guilty of believing anything you read on the
Internet as those who believe that penguins do
this.
The strongest argument the referenced document
offers it that people overanthropomorphise things.
The strongest words used are 'there isn't much
reason to believe it'.
I'll need a better debunking than that. I mean,
I don't categorically believe that it *does*
happen; but this sure as hell isn't proof that it
doesn't.
I know it's not proof, but I can remember a video on "funiest home videos" that showed penguins following one of those little laser dots. Their heads followed the dot as fast as the projector could move it around. And when the dot went over their heads they did all fall over. This is why I was never surprised about the falklands story. $0.02
Actually, it has been proven by psychological studies that clinging children who desire attention and don't have good social skills (including taking responsibility for their actions, not being annoying, etc) have had a lack of strong FATHERhood, not motherhood as you are suggesting.
-S
I spent a fair bit of my childhood in the Falklands, and with a mad keen ornithologist for a father there was much time spent in the penguin colonies getting bitten by their fleas.
Two things-
penguins rarely bother looking up. They have very few predators from the sky (the local turkey buzzards will grab eggs and sickly young)
The noise of jets and helicopters spooks them so they leg it
Amusingly though, back in the days right after the conflict, a C130 hercules flanked by two F4 phantoms used to do the Christmas mail run round the settlements. They'd come in at under 50 feet, phantoms just above stall speed and hercules batting it's little engines out and pull up over each settlement to drop mail and presents.
The sudden noise used to make everyone fall over. As a young teenager I loved it:)
Frog51
Oh the horror!!!
admit defeat, live in decline, be the victim of our own design
Here is a picture of a skua over the Gentoo Penguin colony at Port Lockroy in the Antarctic Peninsula. Of course, the pic is better for the skua than the penguins but you can also check out some of the other shots too!
Who would believe in penguins,unless he had seen them? Conor O Brien - Across Three Oceans
there's ofcxourse the Ig-Nobel awards. this year a dutch guy won for a couple of porn-pics in an MRI machine, to determine the shape of the human penis during copulation. The guy is now trying to get a grant to determine the shape and size of the clitoris, which could benefit a lot of men.. ;)
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
We (as in, in the office) reckon that what is actually happening is that an RAF team are going out to research the stress caused by aircraft to penguins. If they leg it, they are obviously stressed, and could end up abondoning eggs, etc. and therefore it's a worthy piece of research.
The story about them falling over has been added by somebody in a news agency somewhere who had heard the story from a "friend of a friend", or possibly the research team have heard the story and believe it.
....Do Trolls Fall Over When Thoughtout Arguements Fly Right Over Their Heads?
I use Linux. When Black Helicopters fly overhead I fall over backwards.
Coincidence?
An Argentine newspaper reports that bored penguins living on the Falkland Islands have devised what they consider a marvelous new game. Noting that the local Royal Air Force pilots are fascinated by penguins, the birds congregate on a beach where the pilots fly over, and turn their heads slowly in unison while standing at the water's edge. Perhaps ten thousand pilots fly by, and when the penguins turn their heads in the opposite direction the airplanes all fly back, like remote control toys. Then, the paper reports "The penguins look directly out to sea, where the planes follow their gaze. Heads and planes go up, up, up, and ten thousand airplanes run out of fuel and fall splashing into the ocean."
-Pilot Magazine
Does it qualify? Probably not since one has to be a pilot to truly enjoy penguin tipping!
Fly a helicopter slowly towards the beach, just high enough for the little darlings to not scatter and they will indeed watch it until they topple over backwards.
Just because one PR officer says it aint so, doesn't mean that those who have actually seen it are lying. Apparently it is quite hysterical (and it is sheep, not penguins that can't get up when they fall on their backs).
--- Four bases should be enough for any genetic code
You should hear BillG giggle when gets L. Tovald
to fall on his back in the parking lot.
I hate it when I forget my password.
Ciao for now.
I never liked Outland though.
It just lost something in the traslation.......
Yes I can not spell...Wait....for a second there I almost cared.
After the falklands war, the RAF were left there (and still are) to, well, just in case. The pilots understandably got a bit bored by doing routine sorties etc., so they tried something.
Out infront of the officers mess was the rocky coast with penguins on it. They started to notice that the penguins did something when a plane went over.
The pilots would fly one way, and the penguins would watch the plane go by. Then they would fly the other, and the penguins did the same. Then the pilots (just to take the piss) would fly into the shore, right over the penguins, who would look up and back so far that they would all fall over.
After a 9 month tour of duty in this sort of place they found a way of entertaining themselves.
Malike Bamiyi wanted my assistance.
Linus is an expert on penguins, he should authoritatively know the answer.
The majority of penguins will usually fall over when a plane flies overhead, not because of the plane itself, but because of the amount of "windows" in the plane. The sight of so many "windows" disgusts these simple, yet adorable, little critters. Wouldn't you fall down if you saw so many "windows"? I think everybody knows what I'm talking about.
I don't have a fancy sig like you all do, so if you have a problem with that, you can go fsck yourself! ^_^
My favorite anal scientist?
Now really, I am afraid it would be indiscreet of me to answer that question.
-- look, cheese ahoy!
How do they test something like this? just put a bunch of penguins in fly zones, and fly a bunch of planes over them? And what exactly is the point? Why would a penguin fall over when an aircraft goes over anyway? Would it be because they are basically not the most manueverable creatures on earth, and they wanted to see it??? Why wouldn't this apply to penguins watching birds fly over?
Why do seagulls fly over the sea?
Because if they flew over the bay, they would be bay-gulls.
bay-gulls... bagels... get it?? ahhahahha oh, sorry. I really am sorry.
THis seems like a waste of science dept. money. lol
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
I'm being a bit patriotic... but look here
_ Nature/0,1113,2-13-46_935145,00.h tml
http://www.news24.co.za/News24/Technology/Science
Thank you, kind sir.