[Best of]The Great Auk

Science Stories

This is a story of human ignorance, arrogance, stupidity and greed. If we do not learn from this history, we are just as doomed among the species on Earth as the Great Auk. The Great Auk was once a very common bird in the northern hemisphere. The bird could not fly, it was clumsy on land and was easy to catch for sailors and people who used their feathers. Professor Gisli Pálsson has found the description of how the last Auks were hunted down and killed. This story was written by egg collector John Wolley and ornithologist Alfred Newton, during their visit to Iceland in the summer of 1858, ten years after the Auk disappeared. The story is both a tragedy, but it is also a symbolic story about how greed and ignorance can result in the extinction of important animals with major consequences for the food chain and an ecological balance forever. If this extinction of animals and ecosystems continues, the balance of nature could even threaten man. Videnskabsjournalist Jens Degett talked with med professor Gisli Pálsson fra Islands University.