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Subject: mini-AIR Oct 2001 - Announcing the 2001 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
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mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
Issue Number 2001-10
October, 2001
ISSN 1076-500X
Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the
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A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in the
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR),
the journal of inflated research and personalities
================================================================
-----------------------------
2001-10-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
2001-10-01 Table of Contents
2001-10-02 What's New in the Magazine
2001-10-03 Announcing the 2001 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
2001-10-04 Educational Eateries
2001-10-05 Acceptable in Australia?
2001-10-06 Scientist Scrabble
2001-10-07 Chinchilla Seeker
2001-10-08 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Subtle, Hair, Comfort, Hair
2001-10-09 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Halloween Chomp Outlook
2001-10-10 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Joints, Warts, Braininess
2001-10-11 AIRhead Events
2001-10-12 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)
2001-10-13 Our Address (*)
2001-10-14 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2001-10-15 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
mini-AIR is
a free monthly *e-supplement* to AIR, the print magazine
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-02 What's New in the Magazine
AIR 7:5 (Sept/Oct 2001) is a special ANIMAL & VEGETABLE ISSUE.
Here are some further highlights:
<> "The Descent of Animals," compiled by Alice Shirrell Kaswell. A
review of the research literature concerning animals descending
rapidly from heights.
<> "Pycnogonids Rising: The Answer to Sea-Level Rise and Water on
Mars," by Rick McCourt and Earle Spamer.
<> "Icky Cutesy Research Review," compiled by Alice Shirrell
Kaswell. In this new occasional column, we highlight research that
is icky, cutesy, or both.
<> "The HMO-NO Newsletter: Expect the Best." The latest news from
AIR's exemplary managed health care organization.
"Icky Cutesy Research Review," and several of the articles
mentioned here last month -- "Cloning of the Zucchini Opiate
Receptor," "Happyface Spiders," and "The Pliocene Pussy Cat
Theory" -- are now posted on our web site.
The full table of contents is at
<http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume7/v7i5/v7i5-toc.html>
(What you are reading at this moment is mini-AIR,
a small, monthly e-mail supplement to the print magazine.)
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-03 Announcing the 2001 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
The 2001 Ig Nobel Prize winners were announced in a gala ceremony
at Harvard on October 4.
Seven of the ten new winners traveled to Cambridge at their own
expense, and two others sent videotaped acceptance speeches. Four
Nobel Laureates were on hand to physically hand the Prizes to the
winners. Six of the world's great thinkers delivered 24/7
seminars. A new mini-opera premiered. At the end of the
proceedings Lisa Danielson and Will Stefanov, both geologists
based at Arizona State University, were married before 1200 guests
and an Internet television audience in a ceremony lasting 60
seconds.
Skimpy details are at
<http://www.improbable.com/ig/2001/2001-details.html>
Full details will be published in the Jan/Feb 2002 issue of
the Annals of Improbable Research.
Press clippings are at
<http://www.improbable.com/airchives/press/press-top.html>
Links to the winners and their work are at
<http://www.improbable.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html#ig2001>
Here are the new winners:
MEDICINE
Peter Barss of McGill University, for his impactful medical report
"Injuries Due to Falling Coconuts." [PUBLISHED IN: The Journal of
Trauma, vol. 21, no. 11, 1984, pp. 990-1.]
PHYSICS
David Schmidt of the University of Massachusetts for his partial
solution to the question of why shower curtains billow inwards.
BIOLOGY
Buck Weimer of Pueblo, Colorado for inventing Under-Ease, airtight
underwear with a replaceable charcoal filter that removes bad-
smelling gases before they escape.
ECONOMICS
Joel Slemrod, of the University of Michigan Business School, and
Wojciech Kopczuk, of University of British Columbia, for their
conclusion that people find a way to postpone their deaths if that
would qualify them for a lower rate on the inheritance tax.
[REFERENCE: "Dying to Save Taxes: Evidence from Estate Tax Returns
on the Death Elasticity," National Bureau of Economic Research
Working Paper No. W8158, March 2001.]
LITERATURE
John Richards of Boston, England, founder of The Apostrophe
Protection Society, for his efforts to protect, promote, and
defend the differences between plural and possessive.
PSYCHOLOGY
Lawrence W. Sherman of Miami University, Ohio, for his influential
research report "An Ecological Study of Glee in Small Groups of
Preschool Children." [PUBLISHED IN: Child Development, vol. 46,
no. 1, March 1975, pp. 53-61.]
ASTROPHYSICS
Dr. Jack and Rexella Van Impe of Jack Van Impe Ministries,
Rochester Hills, Michigan, for their discovery that black holes
fulfill all the technical requirements to be the location of Hell.
[REFERENCE: The March 31, 2001 television and Internet broadcast
of the "Jack Van Impe Presents" program (at about the 12 minute
mark).]
PEACE
Viliumas Malinauskus of Grutas, Lithuania, for creating the
amusement park known as "Stalin World."
TECHNOLOGY
Awarded jointly to John Keogh of Hawthorn, Victoria, Australia,
for patenting the wheel in the year 2001, and to the Australian
Patent Office for granting him Innovation Patent #2001100012.
PUBLIC HEALTH
Chittaranjan Andrade and B.S. Srihari of the National Institute of
Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore, India, for their
probing medical discovery that nose picking is a common activity
among adolescents. [REFERENCE: "A Preliminary Survey of
Rhinotillexomania in an Adolescent Sample," Journal of Clinical
Psychiatry, vol. 62, no. 6, June 2001, pp. 426-31.]
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-04 Educational Eateries
Ah, the romance of academe! In every college town there is one
special restaurant, a discreet, intimate place with moderately
good food, modest prices, and a liquor license, where professors
take their favorite grad students. In this restaurant many a
professor has begun nurturing the more personal aspects of the
professor-student relationship. In the proper setting, love of
learning can lead to love of professor.
As a public service, the Annals of Improbable Research is
compiling a list of these special restaurants.
Here are the first two entries on the list:
THE ANTLERS, in ITHACA, NEW YORK
HARVEST, in CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS
We invite you to contribute to this helpful list. Please include
the name and location of the restaurant. We also welcome first-
hand reviews (a max of 50 words). Please send items to:
EDUCATIONAL EATERY LIST c/o <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-05 Acceptable in Australia?
We received the following special e-mail message from the
Australian Department of Justice and Attorney-General.
------
Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: mini-AIR Sept 2001 - Math Value / Half-Clever
Rise-Fall
You have sent an E-mail to the Department of Justice
and Attorney-General which contains content that may
violate the Department's acceptable usage policy. As such
it has been blocked from entering the Department's
E-mail system. If the content of this E-mail is required
as part of legitimate business operation, please
contact the helpdesk on 32390001.
------
Our puzzler for you, dear readers, is: What specific content in
last month's mini-AIR violates the Department's acceptable usage
policy?
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-06 Scientist Scrabble
Investigator Carl Witthoft has devised a new game that will
delight many word lovers of a scientific bent. A variant on
popular word game "Scrabble," it involved finding research reports
the authors of which have high-scoring family names. Witthoft
writes:
Submitted as a contestant for the Article Author List
with the Highest Scrabble Score:
JOSEPH LAKOWICZ, IGNACY GRYCZYNSKI, YIBING SHEN,
JOANNA MALIKCKA, and ZYGMUNT GRYCZYNSKI, "Intensified
Fluorescence," Photonics, vol. 35, no. 10, October 2001.
----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-07 Chinchilla Seeker
Investigator Roderick Dugan requests help with an academic
project. Dugan writes:
I am trying to learn about the life and times of investigator
Normal Stolz Chinchilla, lead author of an article that was
published in volume 22, number 1 of the Humboldt Journal of
Social Relations.
If anyone has pertinent information about Normal Stolz Chinchilla,
please send it to "PROJECT NORAL STOLZ CHINCHILLA c/o
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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2001-10-08 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Subtle, Hair, Comfort, Hair
Here are concise, incomplete, flighty mentions of some of the
features we've posted on HotAIR since last month's mini-AIR came
out. You can get to all of them by clicking on "WHAT'S NEW" at the
web site, or by going to:
<http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html>
==> "Subtle Research Topics" (including the classic "Space
Perception in the Chick")
<http://www.improbable.com/news/2001/sep/subtle.html>
==> "This and That About Hair"
<http://www.improbable.com/news/2001/sep/about-hair.html>
==> "Matters of Comfort" (including the much discussed "Texture
and Chemical Feeling Descriptors That 6-11 Year Olds and Adults
Associate With Food in the Mouth")
<http://www.improbable.com/news/2001/sep/comfort.html>
==> New Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club members, and a new entry in
the Parks Prohibition Competition
<http://www.improbable.com/projects/hair/hair-club-top.html>
==> "Drum Research"
<http://www.improbable.com/news/2001/oct/drums.html>
==> "Provocative Perspectives on Healing"
<http://www.improbable.com/news/2001/oct/healing.html>
THESE, AND MORE, ARE ON HOTAIR AT
<http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html>
-----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-09 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Halloween Chomp Outlook
Each month we select for your special attention a research report
that seems especially worth a close read. This month's selection:
PICK OF THE MONTH:
"Do Animals Bite More During a Full Moon? Retrospective
Observational Analysis," Chanchal Bhattacharjee, Peter Bradley,
Matt Smith, Andrew J. Scally, and Bradley J. Wilson, British
Medical Journal, vol. 321, December 23, 2000, pp. 1559-61. (Thanks
to Nancy Hazelton and other readers for bringing this to our
attention.) The authors, who are at Bradford Royal Infirmary and
at University of Bradford, Bradford, U.K., explain that:
The incidence of animal bites rose significantly at the
time of a full moon. With the period of the full moon as
the reference period, the incidence rate ratio of the bites
for all other periods of the lunar cycle was significantly
lower (P <0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The full moon is associated
with a significant increase in animal bites to humans.
The full article is on-line at
<http://www.bmj.org/cgi/content/full/321/7276/1559>
-----------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-10 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Joints, Warts, Braininess
Here is a further selection of items that merit a trip to the
library.
JOINT EFFORT
"The Art of Making a Joint," F. Spitz and D. Duboule, Science,
vol. 291, March 2, 2001, pp. 1713-4. (Thanks to Wim Crusio for
bringing this to our attention.)
CLINICAL CHARM
"Wart Charming Practices Among Patients Attending Wart Clinics,"
K. Steele, British Journal of General Practice, vol. 40, no. 341,
December 1990, pp. 517-8. (Thanks to Bill Holmes for bringing this
to our attention.)
HAND TO BRAIN
"The Relationship Between Handedness and Brainedness," M. J.
Morgan, and I. C. McManus, in Aphasia, F.C. Whurr et al.
(editors), London, 1988, pp. 85-130. (Thanks to Freeman P. Taylor
for bringing this to our attention.)
For additional, more extensive lists of citations, subscribe to
(or borrow any issue of) the magazine.
------------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-11 AIRhead Events
==> For details and updates see <http://www.improbable.com>
==> Want to host an event? <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 617-491-4437
MARIST COLLEGE, POUGHKEEPSIE, NY TUES, DEC 4, 2001
AIR editor MARC ABRAHAMS will present a public talk about
the Ig Nobel Prizes and recent advances and retreats in improbable
research.
Details TBA.
MARIST COLLEGE, POUGHKEEPSIE, NY WED, DEC 5, 2001
Psychology Undergraduate Research Conference (PURC).
AIR editor MARC ABRAHAMS will present a special talk about
psychology and other improbable research.
INFO: Sherry Dingman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 845-677-5084 x
2955
NASW, MUSEUM OF SCIENCE, BOSTON WED, FEB 13, 2002
Evening -- Special Ig Nobel presentation for members of the
National Assn. of Science Writers
AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, BOSTON FRI, FEB 15, 2002
Evening. Exact time and location TBA.
AIR's annual special session at the annual meeting of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Details TBA.
--------------------------------------------------------------
2001-10-12 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)
Here's how to subscribe to the magnificent bi-monthly print
journal The Annals of Improbable Research (the real thing, not
just the little bits of overflow material you have been reading
here in mini-AIR).
...............................................................
Name:
Address:
Address:
City and State:
Zip or postal code:
Country
Phone: FAX: E-mail:
...............................................................
SUBSCRIPTIONS (6 issues per year):
USA 1 yr/$24.95 2 yrs/$44.95
Canada/Mexico 1 yr/$28.95 US 2 yrs/$49.95 US
Overseas 1 yr/$41.95 US 2 yrs/$71.95 US
...............................................................
BACK ISSUES are available, too:
First issue: $8 USA, $11 Canada/Mex, $16 overseas Add'l issues
purchased at same time: $6 each
...............................................................
Send payment (US bank check, or international money order, or
Visa, Mastercard or Discover info) to:
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA
617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-----------------------------------------------------
2001-10-13 Our Address (*)
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA
617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927
EDITORIAL: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
SUBSCRIPTIONS: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
WEB SITE: <http://www.improbable.com>
---------------------------
2001-10-14 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever
appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the
material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR
for commercial purposes.
------------- mini-AIRheads -------------
EDITOR: Marc Abrahams ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last
few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin
([EMAIL PROTECTED])
COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne
DISTRIBUTIVE EDITOR: Robin Pearce
CO-CONSPIRATORS: Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, Craig Haggart, Nicki
Rohloff
MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto
AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon
Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts
(c) copyright 2001, Annals of Improbable Research
-----------------------------------------------------
2001-10-15 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
What you are reading right now is mini-AIR. Mini-AIR is a (free!)
tiny monthly *supplement* to the bi-monthly print magazine.
To subscribe, send a brief E-mail message to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
The body of your message should contain ONLY the words
SUBSCRIBE MINI-AIR MARIE CURIE
(You may substitute your own name for that of Madame Curie.)
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