Improbable Research

How do individuals react to psychedelics? And how does one probe receptor space with psychedelics? A  conference last year in Phoenix, Arizona attempted to bring together answers to these questions.

(Thanks to Bob Frenay for bringing this to our attention.)

A new project

brings echoes of Chris McManus’s Ig Nobel Prize-winning report "Scrotal Asymmetry in Man and Ancient Sculpture."

Inspired by our quest to identify the author of the wonderfully vapid advertising slogan "Without chemicals, life itself would be impossible," investigator Dave "Maddog" Maddox discovered that the phrase inspired a poet to give birth to a poem that begins:

The rain in Spain is bound to contain

Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane…

Our romantic quest was announced in mini-AIR 2005-02. We remain hopeful it will lead to success.

The "Boys Will Be Boys" column in the March/April 2005 issue of the magazine presents another health collection of research by and for adolescent males of all ages. One of the highlights this time is a splendid whopping new survey of colorectal foreign objects that appeared, more or less serendipitously, in a hospital in South Africa.

People who love numbers — truly love them — needn’t hesitate when asked the question: "What is your favourite book?" There is only one possible answer: A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates, published by the Rand Corporation in 1955…

So begins this week’s Improbable Research column in The Guardian.

[And a further note. The Rand Corporation has put a PDF version of the book onto its web site. Thanks to Dan Valente for bringing this to our attention.]