New circumcision study

I have previously written quite a lot about circumcision. See for example (1) here, (2) here, or (3) here. Circumcision proponents use different arguments when they try to spread this surgical procedure. Sometimes they say that your hygiene benefits, which may be true if you never ever clean yourself under the foreskin - hardly a reason for removing the foreskin. Another rather medievil argument is that circumcision will make it harder for the child to masturbate, and after all sexual pleasure is something you should avoid!


The only potentially valid argument for the use of circumcision, an argument which has only been around for perhaps five years (before that circumcision was conducted for irrational reasons entirely), is that it may reduce the risk of getting HIV if you have unprotected sex. Based on this some people argue that we should use mass circumcision to prevent the spread of HIV. There are many arguements against this.

First of all, people normally don't make their sexual debut when they are still in diapers, so let them choose themselves whether they wan't to be circumcised when they have reached an age where they can actually make such decisions. Secondly, condoms work much better than having your penis circumcised, so why not spend all the money advocating the use of condoms and handing them out for free instead? Furthermore, people who have been circumcised may feel safer and therefore have more unprotected sex, thus cancelling the potential gain...

Another serious argument against circumcision is that circumcision may cause serious problems for the patient in terms of penile function and penile sensitivity. The foreskin has a lot of sensory nerve endings. According to estimates that I have read, 50% of the nerve endings in the penis are in the foreskin. Just recently a study investigating the consequences of circumcision came out.

The study seems to show that people who have been circumcised do not suffer from reduced pleasure, at least that is what they say. However, as Mary Crewe points out, studies like these do not take into account psychological biases which are very likely to be at work. If you go and have yourself circumcised (the people in the study voluntered of course), then you will want to justify that decisions afterwards. As a result, minor troubles are likely not to be reported. The patient will simply bite together and say "I am fine, and my sex life is great".

For this reason I think it would be a mistake to start circumcising people based on this type of questionnaire evidence. Some sort of medical examination of penile function (or dysfunction) would be preferred.

The Mating Act of a Ladybird

To describe the copulative behavior of a ladybird, or a coccinellidae as it is called among scientists, is actually quite hard due to the fact that the category contains at least 5000 different species (I wonder if they can tell the difference between us and say a gorilla). The account that I will give here will no doubt be oversimplified and perhaps only applies to a fraction of the 5000 different species, but it is nevertheless a fascinating type behavior.

So imagine that you are a female ladybird. Because you are already four days old you feel it is really about time that you get a hold of yourself and cease to live your life in an aimless fashion. You feel that it is time to get pregnant. While wandering about on your green plant reflecting on where your life has gone you suddenly look up and see an attractive male about 2 cm ahead (which is about how far a ladybird can see). You feel really flattered when this handsome stud mounts you, but then, when he is just about to insert his thing you instinctively start to run around, kicking forcefully backwards to get him off. This stud won't give up that easily though so in spite of the rather uncomfortable ride he hangs on. You therefore switch to a different strategy. Almost to your own amazement you throw yourself of the green plant and falls towards the ground. You make your handsome stud lands first thus making him absorb the long fall. For a second the male lets go of you and you try to escape, but luckily for the male he retains his consciousness before you have been able to run more than 2 cm away in which case he would not have been able to find you.

The stud mounts again and this time you don't fight. Instead you think to yourself, this guy can copulate right after falling down an equivalent of ten floors, now that is a trait I want my ladybird offspring to have. So the romance begins, and since you are ladybirds, and since ladybirds are fond of copulating you go on for a long time. (Here is a video of two ladybirds getting it on to the tunes of Donald Crawford's "You Know I Know".)

If both the male and the female have not mated recently they will keep going for about 275 minutes, or 4.5 hours. However, if both have had sex recently and thus feel a bit tired or drowsy or satisfied, then they will limit they will stop after only 176 minutes or 3 hours.

Following not so much cuddling you depart, exhausted but happy… However, for a ladybird sex is not just joy. Because ladybirds are really really promiscuous animals they are also very often the victims of sexually transmitted diseases, in fact the ladybird has more STDs than any other insect. According to one estimate that I found, up to 90% of some populations of ladybirds can be affected, so you better use the condom (or become a ladybird nun).

Most of what you have read here is my recollection of a lecture that was given to me by Professor Mike Majerus at Cambridge University, UK. In 2004 I attended a science summer school at Fitzwillam college and there I had the great privilege of taking a course called "sex and aggression in insects" taught by this extraordinarily entertaining ladybird world authority (I would vote for him to take over after David Attenborough if he ever quits). Though I have not read his books he has written several, so if you are interested in ladybirds and evolution I am sure that the following books are probably really good references.

Melanism: Evolution in Action: In this book majerus decribes the evolutionary forces that has given rise to melanism, or skin color. I'll bet that many of the examples are on the somewhat rare black ladybirds which he talked alot about during his course.

Guide to Ladybirds of the British Isles: As the title suggests this is a short (8 pages) guide to ladybirds.