1/10/2006: Cyclops kitten born

This AP news wire image was suggested by three different IotD readers, thanks! (Don't assume I've already seen something or that it's already been submitted... you never know.)

Can't possibly be true, I thought when I saw it -- it looks entirely fake. But it's a wire service image, and so it's has gone through *some* degree of real journalistic review. It became Yahoo's most popular image within hours.

They say this kitten was born this way, with one centered eye and no nose. They say they named it "Cy". They say it lived a day and then died. They say it was one of a litter of two and that the other kitten was normal and lived. They say the picture was "provided by the owner".

Snopes has yet to weigh in.

I don't know, and so this is presented with the thought that somebody has put together a pretty strong hoax, but... what do you think?

Let's hope the story doesn't end up like that of Polyphemus who was the son of Poseidon and the nymph Thoosa. He was the one-eyed giant Cyclops famous from the Odyssey, who imprisoned Odysseus and his men in a cave. Since Polyphemus was eating Odysseus' men, Odysseus was under some pressure to figure a way out, which he did. Odysseus tricked Polyphemus, poked out his eye, and got his remaining men out of the cave and into safety.

Here's what he ended up like.

It sure looks fake to me, but I saw it in two different newspapers, so it must be true.

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrisinhouston Let's hope the story doesn't end up like that of Polyphemus who was the son of Poseidon and the nymph Thoosa. He was the one-eyed giant Cyclops famous from the Odyssey, who imprisoned Odysseus and his men in a cave. Since Polyphemus was eating Odysseus' men, Odysseus was under some pressure to figure a way out, which he did. Odysseus tricked Polyphemus, poked out his eye, and got his remaining men out of the cave and into safety.

Aren't all kittens born with blue eyes?

Normally. But then, they're normally born with two eyes, as well. I'm still waiting on snopes' take.

A mixup at the sperm bank with Homer Simpsons 'genetic material'?

Snopes says it's the real deal .

Blimey - I thought it was too soon to look on snopes to be honest. I'm finding it less creepy and more sad now that I know it's real....

It *was* too early to check Snopes - they posted their item between 9 and 11 am Eastern!

I didn't know this could actually happen, but it does give some context to the Greek legends, doesn't it? Weird-ass mysterious creature with one eye is born somewhere, tales of it filter around, pretty soon it's worked into the mystical stories as well.

Highjack. Are all white cats with blue eyes deaf? I know someone who had 2 and both
were deaf.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...eyed+cats+deaf

busterb-yes.

I feel so sorry for that thing. Kind of reminds me of Leela...poor cyclops orphan girl.

It is *extremely* rare for deformities in mammals to be this perfectly symmetrical. I wouldn't be so amazed by a cyclopic cat that had one eye kind of slightly off to one side, sloped a bit or otherwise misshapen, but this one is too *perfect*.

I thought cats were born with their eyes closed?

The snopes article addresses that.

But the part of my brain that assesses "normal" and "okay" is insisting that the picture looks 'Shopped.

Oh please, let it turn out to be 'Shopped, so that I can sleep.

The eye looks way to big. kittens eyes are nowhere near that size. They are tiny, blue, relfective, closed and even if thats two eyes mutated together it couldn't be that big!!

surely he should have frozen the kitten corpse for proof and study.

I've seen a real cyclopic human baby, pickled in a jar. It was similar enough to this kitten picture to convince me that the kitten picture is real.

Considering how complicated the process is, between the sperm/egg and the finished product, it's a miracle any of them turn out "right".

Please define "right"

True. creation is amazing and complicated.. its ineviatable that it should stuff up sometimes. I just read that snopes thing said that the big eye thing is a symptom of the cyclops deformity(or whatever it is).

<i>It is *extremely* rare for deformities in mammals to be this perfectly symmetrical.</i>

And ....

<I>creation is amazing and complicated.. its ineviatable that it should stuff up sometimes. </i>

Actually I think the word you wanted to use (i.e. the word I would have use if I were you) was "evolution". As in "evolution is amazing and complicated". I realize that our difference in expression may be due to differences in political thought.

Howere, if we can agree to disagree about the proper word use in this instance (i.e creation/evolution), then I am in complete agreement with your statement.

[o.k. but seriously,have you read <a href="http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf">this opinion?</a> [warning! pdf]. It is AMAZING LAW, imho.]

<i>It is *extremely* rare for deformities in mammals to be this perfectly symmetrical.</i>

And ....

<I>creation is amazing and complicated.. its ineviatable that it should stuff up sometimes. </i>

Actually I think the word you wanted to use (i.e. the word I would have use if I were you) was "evolution". As in "evolution is amazing and complicated". I realize that our difference in expression may be due to differences in political thought.

Howere, if we can agree to disagree about the proper word use in this instance (i.e creation/evolution), then I am in complete agreement with your statement.

[o.k. but seriously,have you read <a href="http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf">this opinion?</a> [warning! pdf]. It is AMAZING LAW, imho.]

I wonder if Ripley's wound up with the corpse.

Im no expert either, but it seems to me that it is missing indeed like a strip of skull in the middle of the head! Thats propably why the eye is so big and there is no nose! Maybe even a part of the brain ....There are surely humans born like this, look at the years that came after the Tsjernobil disaster...we didnt get to see all those "things" that wer born...

There is a documentary called "Chernobyl Heart" that shows a lot of the malformed children born after the meltdown.

I saw it on HBO. I have a very high tolerance for stuff, but this was difficult to watch.


edit to add: HBO's description is much more comprehensive

My point is more along the lines of:

If you cut a dog's tail off, and then breed it, it will not produce puppies with short tails.

If a dog wears plutonium underwear, it may get a mutation of its sperm's DNA, and may have puppies with short tails.

In this case, according to the Snopes linked article, after many weeks of gestation, the fetus "has its tail cut off" when the mother is exposed to toxins which interrupt the development of the fetus. The DNA isn't altered, so the changes aren't a mutation that can be passed along to the next generation, the way evolution works.

Huge mistake: I did an image search for "cyclopia". The nightmares are going to last for weeks.

True. I only use (used) the word creation as just that.. something being created. No political or spiritual meaning behind it.

Evolution i dont see coming into this, i doubt that any day soon we will evolve into cyclopic races of humans, goats and felines. But a sixth digit on our hands that acts as our car key perhaps.. longer thumbs for text messaging... Molar teeth strong enough to open that stuck on nail polish bottle lid.... a can opener bone developed into our wrists for easy baked bean access on the road.. now THATS what I'm talkin bout!!

And a finger long enough to find the G-spot.

As a quick note to defend my original point. The definition of "cyclopia" that Snopes links to includes this bit.

so if evolution is going to come in to the equation, wouldn't that mean that it would, by definition, have to start happening more often? because THAT is a scary thought.

Only if it conferred some advantage. Which doesn't seem likely.

Anyone think it may be a by-product of evolution? throw a stone in a pond and nothing in it is left undisturbed in some way. The same rules apply in the genome of any animal. Whatever gene is next to the one that gets broken/switched/lost that causes this may be related to the one that's getting passed down through mammals that survive. Hell, there are diseases caused by a piece of DNA breaking off of one allele and getting attached to another. It all happens in patterns.

In time, bloodlines will either stomp this out, or cycloptic kitties will be saved, nurtured, and stabilised by intrusive humans, and become the next American celebrity pet fad.

That's exactly it, though it could also involve an evironmental factor interacting with the genetics. For example, as mentioned previously, the mother eating a plant that contained a certain toxin.

The ways evolution could be involved in that case are, for example:

1) Animals who dislike the taste of the plant reproduce more successfully, eventually most of the population avoids it.

2) Animals which are less succeptible to the toxin reproduce more successfully, eventually most of the population can eat the plant without problems

Welcome to the Cellar, flesh golem.

No, the tail size is written in the DNA. But if you neutered the dogs with long tails, and only bred the short-tailed ones, after a few generations, they would all have short tails. If you tried to breed them for shorter and shorter tails, eventually they would have no tail.

All dogs are the same species -- even the chihuahua and the great dane. They've simply been bred for specific purposes for a few hundred years. But if the dane has sex with the huahua, they will have a litter of dogs.

Don't you have cats at the Lumberjinx homestead?

* * *

Yeah, but a great dane is considerably more than twice the size of a chihuahua, and dogs have multiple births as a general rule...

Via Boingboing. We'll miss you, tiny freakish kitten!

...And someday, thousands of years from now, anthropologists will assume that as a society we worshipped a mythical cyclops cat, whose all-seeing eye governed our daily lives.

Only on IotD, Greek and Bio-lessons over a cat

And who modded IotD down on the educational scores. I've learned more useless greek info (unless there are hot greek girls reading this) and bio / genetics in the last few moments than I picked up in school.

Maybe you could offer the BS in IotD as a degree program.

Well, lt that be a lesson to you.

I can clearly see that it's fake. Beside, kittens that young don't even have their eyes open, simple fact. The originator of the hoax should be turned into a cyclops.

Welcome to the Cellar, AureliusVin.
You're saying you don't buy all the explanations of why the eye is open, like no eyelids?

Yes hello everyone, happy to be here! I guess the Capn is right, cool then!

Welcome to the Cellar, AureliusVin.

[From the Boston Globe:]

Famous one-eyed kitten to go on display

April 5, 2006

GRANBY, N.Y. --The one-eyed, noseless kitten that inspired an international debate last year over whether it was a hoax is coming to a new museum of oddities in central New York.

The museum founder, who believes in creationism, said the kitten is meant to launch another debate about how science and religion intersect.

The Oregon woman who owned the kitten said she turned down Ripley's Believe it or Not! and sold the remains to John Adolfi of Granby because she liked his religious reasons for wanting them.

"We didn't want Cy becoming a joke or part of a personal collection," Traci Allen said. "But John was so heartfelt, you could tell he was genuine and sincere."

Adolfi would not say how much he paid for the kitten, named Cy, for Cyclops. He said he plans to have it embalmed Wednesday at a local funeral home.

The kitten died in December, a day after being born. Veterinarians in Oregon said it suffered from a rare disorder called holoprosencephaly.

Cy will be displayed in a glass jar in the Lost World Museum, which Adolfi hopes to open in nearby Phoenix this fall.

Other exhibits will include giant plants and eggs, deformed animal remains and archaeological finds, Adolfi said.

http://www.boston.com/news/odd/artic...p1=MEWell_Pos2

Don't forget; first she preserved it somehow for three months, then she sold it.

@jinx

When I was a little girl. We had a white cat with blue eyes. She had 3 black polka dots on the top of her head. When she had a litter of kittens they were white and born with either 1,2 or 3 black polka dots on the top of their head.

I remember because I kissed every one. Was the oddest sight.

I hesitate to post this, because it's a bit gross, but there was a recent birth in India of a human cyclops. The baby was still alive after 7 days, and doctors thought it might survive.

The Indian cyclops baby was still alive as of 11 days old. Wired magazine has done an article about it. They think the mom took some cancer medication that is known to cause birth defects when she went to a fertility clinic for fertilitytreatment. The story is a little unclear, but the plot line is similar to The Constant Gardener, where drug companies do unethical clinical trials in poor people in the third world in exchange for basic healthcare.

Here's a very hi res picture of the baby. I won't post it into the thread, because it's disturbing. Poor thing.

I've seen that kid's Father.