After I saw the wonderful movie March of the Penguins, I found myself thinking about some of my patients. The penguins are stoic and endearing, and it’s tragic to learn how, from time immemorial, they have trudged seventy miles inland from the sea, endured indescribable hardships to reach their breeding grounds, lost numerous viable eggs to exposure, and then, almost starving, dragged themselves back to the ocean. If penguins had our frontal lobes, they would have used their little flippers to build igloos, devised a better division of labor, and reorganized their food supplies. Many of my
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