Improbable Research

The May issue of mini-AIR just went out. Topics include: Questions About Victor Vroom; Dead Duck Day is Coming; Questions About Sam Speed; Most-Plagiarized Paper Project; Questions About Quentin Quick; Seriously Open Access; Old Intestines Poet; Swedish Crisp Bread Salivation Competition; The Power of Debugging; BLOGLIGHTS: Not Even Wrong, Bozo and the Bush; Vacuum Caution, Near Dancers; etc.

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This keynote speech was delivered at the Fourteenth First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, on September 30, 2004, at Sanders Theatre, Harvard University. The theme of that year’s ceremony was: Diet.

John Trinkaus is Professor Emeritus at the Zicklin School of Business, New York City. He was awarded the 2003 Ig Nobel Literature Prize for publishing more than eighty (80) academic reports about things that annoyed him.

Diets go back, probably, to the start of time. Eve had an apple diet that she had Adam on. And we talk about the ancient Greeks — you think they were talking about philosophical things like the meaning of life? No. They were talking about diets. We had the ancient Romans — you think they were talking about the design of the new catapult? No. Diets. The medieval period — you think the lords were talking about increased productivity for the serfs? No. Diets. Elizabeth — you thought she was talking about expanding the empire? No. Diets.

But none of them worked. Even the famous Trinkaus Brussels Sprouts Diet did not work. [Editor?s note: This is a reference to one of Professor Trinkaus?s Prize-winning papers.] It seems nobody liked Brussels sprouts.

But tonight you?re going to get the straight scoop about diets. Remember, you heard it here first. Here it is. It all can be summed up in four words, and you should remember these four words: Keep your mouth shut.

(That’s an excerpt from the article “The Ig Nobel Keynote Speeches,” published in AIR 11:1.)

This photo shows a strawberry, found in Salem, Massachusetts, that resembles the profile of film director Alfred Hitchcock. The inset photo show the classic Hitchcock profile. (PHOTO: Jesse Eppers.)

(That’s an excerpt from AIR 14:3. A glorious large version of the photo appears on the magazine’s back cover.)

Evann Souza has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. Kris Gremillion, who nominated her, says:

Dr. Deborah Pearsall’s hair is both luxuriant and flowing should be clearly apparent from the accompanying photograph. Dr. Pearsall is a world-renowned expert in the field of paleoethnobotany. She and her hair ? a constant companion ? have undertaken numerous research expeditions in Latin America in search of the microscopically sized particles that document the origins of agriculture.

Deborah Pearsall, PHD, LFHCfS
Professor of Anthropology
University of Missouri
Columbia, Missouri, USA

Investigator Gary Dryfoos saw the discussion about April in Paris, and offers a non-dialectical analysis:

“Scientifically speaking, exactly what makes April in Paris delightful?”

Well you know, the song “April in Paris” has let down a lot of tourists who find the weather kind of damp and crappy. May is much nicer, downright lovely. Lyricist E.Y. “Yip” Harburg knew this, but for him it was a matter of scansion ? “Maa-aay in Paris” just didn’t work with the tune composed by Vernon Duke. So “April” it became.

So much for climatological accuracy in music.