Improbable Research

Annals of Improbable Research

The journal of record for inflated research and personalities

NOVEMBER | DECEMBER 2008 (volume 14, number 6)
Special Issue: The 2008 Ig® Nobel Prizes

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Contents

The features marked with a star (*) are based entirely on material taken straight from standard research (and other Official and Therefore Always Correct) literature. Many of the other articles are genuine, too, but we don’t know which ones.

The features marked with a star (*) are based entirely on material taken straight from standard research (and other Official and Therefore Always Correct) literature. Many of the other articles are genuine, too, but we don’t know which ones.

Some New Winners Moments after the 2008 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony at Harvard’s Sanders Theatre, several of the winners posed with their Prizes. As per tradition (and necessity), the winners traveled to Sanders Theatre at their own expense. Front row, left to right: Peace Prize co-winner Urs Thurnherr from Switzerland, Cognitive Science Prize co-winners Atsushi Tero and Toshiyuki Nakagaki from Japan, Literature Prize winner David Sims from the U.K., Cognitive Science Prize co-winner Ryo Kobayashi from Japan, and Wan Hong, who accepted the Medicine Prize on behalf of her father, Chuang-Ye Hong, and his colleagues in Taiwan. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Special Section: The 2008 Ig Nobel Prizes

IFC Some Ig Nobel Prize Winners*
6 The 18th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony* — Stephen Drew
10 A Special Ceremony in Genoa*—Nan Swift
12 The 2008 Ig Nobel Prize Winners*
16 The Ig Nobel Acceptance Speeches*
21 An Ig Nobel Tribute to Coca-Cola* — Nan Swift
22 The 24-7 Lectures*
24 Mini-opera Libretto: “Redundancy, Again”—Stephen Foster, Charles B. Ward, Samuel A. Ward and Marc Abrahams

Improbable Research Reviews*

4 Improbable Research Review* — Dirk Manley
5 Improbable Medical Review* — Bertha Vanatian
28 Boys Will Be Boys*— Katherine Lee

News & Notes

2 AIR Vents (letters from our readers)
3 Improbable Research Editorial Board
9 Introducing Improbable TV
11 Teachers’ Guide
22 AIR books
30 HMO-NO News: Digestive Woes!
30 Back Issues
32 CARTOON: “Lost” — Nick Kim
IBC Unclassified Ads

On the Front Cover

Dr. Deborah Anderson, co-winner of the 2008 Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine, delivers her acceptance speech. Dr. Anderson and her team discovered that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide. They shared the prize with a group of doctors who discovered that it is not. Photo: Kees Moeliker / Improbable Research.

On the Back Cover

The 2008 Ig Nobel Prize. Hand-built by Eric Workman, made of exceedingly cheap materials, the prize reflects the theme of the year’s Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony. This year’s theme is Redundancy. Photo: Eric Workman / Improbable Research.

Coming Events

Science Friday (NPR) Ig Nobel radio broadcast — November 28, 2008
AAAS Annual Meeting, Chicago, Illinois, USA — February 13, 2009
Ig Nobel Tour of the UK — March 6–15, 2009
SciFest Africa, Grahamstown, Eastern Cape, South Africa — March 25–26, 2009
(see WWW.IMPROBABLE.COM for details of these and other events)

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AIR Vents

Exhalations from our readers

Mouthblown in China, Again
I found another example of glassware produced in China and marked “Mouthblown in China.” I am sorry this did not appear with my study (“Mouthblown in China,” AIR 13:7). Like the items I discussed there, this one is ambiguous in its meaning insofar as having the phrase “Mouthblown in China” stamped on it. Like the items I discussed there, this one has been the subject of legal allegations as to whether the meaning, and the intended use of the object, is (a) sacred or (b) strikingly profane.

Sarah Junovsky
Research Analyst
Kyoto History of Science and Society Society

Could Have Been Him
I was mortified to read in newspaper reports of this year’s awards, that Dorian Raymer and Douglas Smith had won the Ig Nobel Physics prize “for proving mathematically that heaps of string or hair or almost anything else will inevitably tangle themselves up in knots.”

I have been in the computer business for over 30 years, and for much of that time I’ve been telling my clients not to bother re-arranging and tidying the cables behind their computers, as within five minutes they will revert to their natural state of entanglement.

Now I learn that two Johnny-come-latelies have not only come up with the same theory independently, but worse, have published it. If only I’d followed my dream of becoming a research scientist, I could have been up on that stage instead of them.

Bill Burns
ftldesign.com
Long Island NY USA


Ig Avoidance
After attending the Ig Nobel ceremony this year, I intend to stay away from:
1) women holding Coke with their hands; and especially
2) men wearing sterile gloves.

I should try to expand my networking more with brainless organisms/people.

I have a question. The sword swallowing is always scary. I wonder if what the sword swallower was chewing was some anesthetic?

Shoichi Fukayama, Ph.D.
Brookline, MA

Red/Bull Theoretician
I found the discussion (“Red: Bull,” AIR14:4) of George Stratton’s research into the folklore that the color red infuriates bulls very illuminating and very much no bull.

I offer another explanation of the observation that the color red has indeed infuriated at least some bulls. This observation does not require belief that it is the color red that is directly infuriating the bull. Another article in the same issue, “Choose Red, Then Fail,” which reviews the study “Color and Psychological Functioning: the Effect of Red on Performance Attainment’’ by Elliot et al., points out that at least in some ways, people’s behavior is changed in the presence of the color red and that these people are not even aware of the change. Perhaps what infuriated the bull in the observations was not the color red but aggressive, bull-infuriating behavior of the person who had just seen red, behavior of which the person was not even conscious.

I hope someone will follow up on George Stratton’s work.

Daniel M. Berry
University of Waterloo
Waterloo, Ontario

Whose Head?
It’s appropriate for AIR to display (AIR Vents 14:5) the presumably non-digitally doctored photo of the 1911 gathering in Brussels’ Metropole Hotel. I first saw a direct print hung in the hotel’s lobby about thirty years ago, before PhotoShop, and noticed that the Solvay head appears to have been crudely pasted over someone’s body. The head is far too large (compared with others) and its illumination is different from adjacent heads (did he have his own spot-light?), proving that Mr. Solvay either had a less central seat or wasn’t there for the photo-op. (This photo also, I discovered, appears in Solvay’s annual reports.)

The letter writer’s claim that the defaced face is Mel’s face is not correct. In fact the body under the pasted head is that of Mel and I believe that this is the earliest and only surviving photo of Mel’s torso. AIR’s staff should now combine the torso and head photos using digital techniques as we continue the search for the rest of Mel.

Lester A. Gimpelson
Bruxelles, Belgium

Tasting versus Chewing
Here is a short lesson (pertaining to the article “The Tasting of the Shrew,” AIR 14:5) in mammal systematics. A shrew is an insectivore and a vole a rodent. There is a big difference in dental structure and (thus) food choice. Shrews, contrary to voles, have a strong musk taste. Many predators dislike that taste and leave them alone. A cat will only kill a shrew, but does not swallow. The guy who digested the shrew did not chew on it. A wise decision.

Kees Moeliker
Curator
Natuurhistorisch Museum Rotterdam
The Netherlands

Maybe Mel, Pointedly
We recently purchased a large quantity of photographs at auction. It included several boxes marked “Mel.” We have no information other than that about the several hundred photographs that were in those boxes. Perhaps they pertain to the Mel who so often appears, or appears to appear, in your letters column? Here is one of our new treasures. The arrow was stamped in it. Does the arrow point to Mel?

Lheal Chormnast
TRPNOF Archives
Moldavia

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Improbable Research Review

Improbable theories, experiments, and conclusions
compiled by Dirk Manley, Improbable Research staff

Tequila Makes Good Diamonds
“Growth of Diamond Films from Tequila,” Javier Morales, Miguel Apatiga and Victor M. Castano, 2008, arXiv:0806.1485. (Thanks to Leslie Lawrence for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, Mexico, and at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, report:

Diamond thin films were grown using Tequila as precursor by Pulsed Liquid Injection Chemical Vapor Deposition (PLI-CVD) onto both silicon (100) and stainless steel 304 at 850 C. The diamond films were characterized by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Raman spectroscopy. The spherical crystallites (100 to 400 nm) show the characteristic 1332 cm-1 Raman band of diamond.

Jason Brown’s summary of the components of the mystery chord that begins the Beatles song “A Hard Day’s Night.”

The Mathematician Who Tackled the Beatles
“Mathematics, Physics and A Hard Day’s Night,” Jason I. Brown, Canadian Mathematical Society Notes, October 2004. (Thanks to investigator David Holzman for bringing this to our attention.) The author, at Dalhousie University, reports:

In this article we shall use mathematics and the physics of sound to unravel one of the mysteries of rock ’n’ roll—how did the Beatles play the opening chord of “A Hard Day’s Night”? The song may never sound the same
to you again.

We welcome your suggestions for this and other columns. Please enclose the full citation (no abbreviations!) and, if possible, a copy of the paper.

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Improbable Medical Review

Improbable diagnoses, techniques, and research
compiled by Bertha Vanatian, Improbable Research staff

Cockroaches at Sea: Risks
“Occupational Health Risks Due to Shipboard Cockroaches,” Marcus Oldenburg, Ute Latza, and Xaver Baur, International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, vol. 81, no. 6, May 2008, pp. 727–34, DOI 10.1007/s00420-007-0247-3. (Thanks to Tom Gill for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at the University of Hamburg and at the Hamburg State Department for Social Affairs, Family, Health and Consumer Protection, report:

In July 2005, a total of 145 seamen sailing under the German flag were recruited from a medical surveillance program for a cross-sectional study (response 95.4%). A standardized interview and a skin prick test (SPT) with nine common inhalant allergens and a cockroach extract (Blatella germanica) were performed. In cockroach-sensitized seafarers total and cockroach-specific IgE was measured and lung function tests conducted.

Results: Neither current or past cockroach exposure on board nor cumulative cockroach exposure and time since last cockroach exposure were associated with cockroach sensitization.

Missing Dentures (1)
“Mystery of the Missing Denture: An Unusual Cause of Respiratory Arrest in a Nonagenarian,” Amit Arora, Mona Arora and Christine Roffe, Age and Ageing, vol. 34, no. 5, September 2005, pp. 519–20. (Thanks to Lily Emlath for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at Keele University, Staffordshire, U.K. and at Staffordshire General Hospital, Stafford, report:

To ask older people about loose or ill-fitting dentures is not common practice during a hospital admission. Our patient presented to the emergency department following a primary respiratory arrest. A dislodged denture was extracted from the hypo-pharynx under local anaesthesia and was presumably the cause of the respiratory arrest.... We suggest that asking about loose-fitting dentures should form part of comprehensive geriatric assessment.

Missing Dentures (2)

“A Missing Denture’s Misadventure!” I. Samarasam, S. Chandran, V. Shukla, and G. Mathew, Diseases of the Esophagus, vol. 19, no. 1, 2006, pp. 53–5. The authors, at Christian Medical College and Hospital, Vellore, Tamilnadu, India, report:

We report a late onset, benign, tracheoesophageal fistula in a 51-year-old man, due to an accidentally swallowed denture. In view of the extensive peri-esophageal sepsis and fibrosis, he was managed by a subtotal esophagectomy and a cervical esophagogastric anastomosis. The tracheal defect was closed with the help of an intercostal muscle flap. This report also highlights the difficulty in identifying swallowed prosthetic dental material radiologically, when no metallic component is present. This fact was also responsible for the delay in diagnosis, eventually leading to the rare complication of a tracheoesophageal fistula.

The ceremony opened with Dan Meyer, co-winner of the 2007 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize, reprising the brief acceptance speech he gave last year, in which he summed up the study, co-written with colleague Brian Witcombe, called “Sword-Swallowing and Its Side Effects.” This year Dr. Thomas Michel, the Dean of Education at Harvard Medical School, removes the sword from Mr. Meyer’s throat. Photo: John Bradley.

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The 18th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony

by Stephen Drew, Improbable Research staff

NOTE: To see video of the entire ceremony, see the Improbable Research web site: www.improbable.com.

The 2008 Ig Nobel Prizes, honoring achievements that first make people LAUGH and then make them THINK, were awarded at Harvard University’s historic Sanders Theatre on October 4, before 1,200 spectators. This was the 18th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony.

Seven of the ten new winners journeyed to Harvard—at their own expense—to accept their prizes. (This year two of the prizes were handed out three weeks later in Italy, at a special ceremony. For details about why and what, see “A Special Ceremony in Genoa,” in this issue of the magazine.)

The Ig Nobel performing scientists prepare to perform one of their two Moments of Science. Photo: John Bradley.

Ignitaries and The Mysteriously Missing Persons

Nobel Laureate William Lipscomb (Chemistry 1976) personally shook the hand of each winner. He was assisted by Amity and Mira Wilczek, the daughters of 2004 Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek, who was unable to himself be present and who instead sent a dummy version of himself, which accompanied Amity and Mira. Several other Nobel Laureates had planned to be part of the ceremony, but a collection of unrelated incidents (some mildly bizarre, others massively mundane) resulted in them not making it to Sanders Theatre. Several of the ceremony organizers, too, were not able to take part, one because she had just entered a monastery.

William Lipscomb, 1976 Nobel Laureate in chemistry, and Benoit Mandelbrot, creator of the mathematical concept of fractals, toast the 2008 Ig Nobel Chemistry Prize winners—a team of doctors in America who discovered that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide and a team of doctors in Taiwan who discovered that it is not. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Professor Lipscomb also was the prize in the annual Win-a-Date-With-a-Nobel-Laureate Contest. In a second contest, Benoit Mandelbrot, inventor of the mathematical concept of fractals, was given away to another lucky audience member.

The event was produced by the Annals of Improbable Research, and co-sponsored by the Harvard-Radcliffe Science Fiction Association, the Harvard-Radcliffe Society of Physics Students and the Harvard-Radcliffe Computer Society.

The too-numerous Ignitaries were herded, politely yet firmly, by Ig Nobel Majordomo Gary Dryfoos and Minordomos Julia Lunetta, James Mahoney, Anna Eliseeva, Peaco Todd, and Natasha Rosenberg. (For a complete list of ceremony participants, see the official program, IgBill, a copy of which is on our web site.)

William Lipscomb, assisted by Minordomo Peaco Todd, scans the audience trying to see who will win a date with him in the Win-a-Date-With-a-Nobel-Laureate Contest. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Redundancy
The evening also featured numerous tributes to the evening’s theme of Redundancy. Foremost were the 24/7-Lectures, in which famous thinkers explained their field of research, first in twenty-four (24) seconds, and then in seven (7) words. (Transcripts of those lectures are published in this issue.) The night also featured the premiere of a new mini-opera called “Redundancy, Again” (see the libretto, again, elsewhere in this issue).

V-Chip Monitor William J. Maloney, a prominent New York attorney, attempted to enforce Sanders Theatre’s strict rules about the throwing of paper airplanes. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

Redundant Returns of Past Winners
Several past Ig Nobel winners also participated in the ceremony, each giving a brief, personal tribute to the concept of REDUNDANCY.

Dan Meyer, co-winner of the 2007 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize winner (for the study “Sword-Swallowing and Its Side Effects”), returned to swallow his pride and joy, a shiny new sword, at the opening of this year’s ceremony.

Kees Moeliker, the 2003 Ig Nobel Biology Prize winner (for writing the world’s first scientific account of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck), helped translate portions of the ceremony into Dutch. He teamed with other linguists who simultaneously translated the proceedings into several languages, all of them speaking simultaneously into the same microphone. Their translations were coordinated by Karen Hopkin, creator of the Studmuffins of Science Calendar. Hopkin also narrated the mini-opera.

Don Featherstone, the 1996 Ig Nobel Art Prize winner (for creating the now-ubiquitous plastic pink flamingo), and his wife, Nancy, and their little dog returned to Sanders Theatre to take a bow. They were greeted with rapturous applause.

The winner collects her prize. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

Dr. Francis Fesmire, a 2006 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize winner (for his medical report “Termination of Intractable Hiccups with Digital Rectal Massage”), waved his finger to the crowd. He was greeted with rapturous, if apprehensive, applause.

Speeches and Other Redundancies
Each new winner (or team of winners) was permitted a maximum of sixty (60) seconds to deliver an acceptance speech; the time limit was enforced by Miss Sweetie Poo, a cute, undauntable eight-year-old girl.

2006 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize winner Francis Fesmire, author of the study “Termination of Intractable Hiccups with Digital Rectal Massage,” returned this year to take another bow. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

The ceremony began with Professor Helen Haste, of Bath University (UK) and Harvard University, delivering the traditional Welcome Welcome speech (which consisted in its entirety of the phrase “Welcome, welcome”). It closed with the traditional salute, “If you didn’t win an Ig Nobel prize tonight—and especially if you did—better luck next year.”

Two days after the ceremony, the winners assembled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the Ig Informal Lectures to explain, if they could, what they did and why they did it. Each winner or team gave a five-minute talk and answered questions from the audience.

Portions of the ceremony are simultaneously translated into five languages: English, Canadian, Bostonian, British, and Double-Talk. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

NEXT YEAR’S CEREMONY: The 19th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony will occur on Thursday night, October 1, 2009, at Sanders Theatre. Tickets will go on sale in August. The Ig Informal Lectures will happen two days later, on Saturday afternoon, October 3, 2008.

Two days after the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, the new winners and several past winners gave brief public talks at MIT, at the Ig Informal Lectures. Here 2003 Biology Prize winner Kees Moeliker gives new insights on the ramifications of his discovery of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck. Photo: Gary Dryfoos.

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Introducing Improbable TV

We are pleased to introduce the Improbable Research TV series.

What: Three-minute videos about research that makes people laugh, then makes them think.

Where: On the web, at www.improbable.com and elsewhere.

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Dan Meyer (with sword in mouth) and David Gross (with sword in hand).

A Special Ceremony in Genoa

by Nan Swift, Improbable Research staff
photos by Robin Abrahams, Improbable Research staff

Two of the 2008 Ig Nobel Prizes were awarded at a special ceremony in Italy, at the Genoa Science Festival, on Friday evening, October 24. These winners had planned to attend the regular Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony three weeks earlier, at Harvard University in the United States, but were prevented from doing so by circumstances beyond their control.

The ceremony occurred in Genoa’s Ducal Palace, before an overflow audience, many of whom listened on headsets as the proceedings were translated from English into Italian or vice versa.

Drs. Christel Joubert (left) and Marie-Christine Cadiergues, flea-jump experimenters, relaxing prior to the ceremony.

Professor Massimiliano Zampini, half of the team that electronically modified the sound of a potato chip to make the person chewing the chip believe it to be crisper and fresher than it really is. .

Massimiliano Zampini of the University of Trento, Italy, co-winner (with Charles Spence of the University of Oxford, U.K.) of the Ig Nobel Prize in Nutrition, received his prize and delivered an acceptance speech. Marie-Christine Cadiergues and Christel Joubert, co-winners (with Michel Franc) of the Biology Prize, drove to Genoa from their homes in France.

Nobel Laureate David Gross (Physics 2004) helped honor the new Ig Nobel Prize winners. Gross not only shook hands with each winner, but also joined with 2007 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize winner Dan Meyer in a sword-swallowing and retrieval demonstration. Meyer swallowed. Gross retrieved. Meyer and Dr. Brian Witcombe, co-authors of the prize-winning study about swordswallowers and their medical histories, delivered a 15-minute talk.

Dan Ariely and the three volunteer time-keepers who helped the speakers keep their talks crisply brief.

Another of the new Ig Nobel Prize winners—Dan Ariely, co-author of the study showing that expensive fake medicine is more effective than inexpensive fake medicine—had already been scheduled to be the main speaker at the Genoa Science Festival. This happy coincidence made it possible for him to also take part in the Ig Nobel special ceremony.

Dr. Brian Witcombe, co-author of the British Medical Journal study “Sword-Swallowing and Its Side Effects.”

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AIR Teachers’ Guide

Three out of five teachers agree: curiosity is a dangerous thing, especially in students. If you are one of the other two teachers, AIR and mini-AIR can be powerful tools. Choose your favorite hAIR-raising article and give copies to your students. The approach is simple. The scientist thinks that he (or she, or whatever), of all people, has discovered something about how the universe behaves. So:

• Is this scientist right—and what does “right” mean, anyway?

• Can you think of even one different explanation that works as well or better?

• Did the test really, really, truly, unquestionably, completely test what the author thought he was testing?

• Is the scientist ruthlessly honest with himself about how well his idea explains everything, or could he be suffering from wishful thinking?

• Some people might say this is foolish. Should you take their word for it?

• Other people might say this is absolutely correct and important. Should you take their word for it?

Kids are naturally good scientists. Help them stay that way.

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The 2008 Ig Nobel Prize Winners

Here are the winners of the 2008 Ig Nobel Prizes. For further details, including links to many of the winners’ web sites and video of the entire ceremony, see the Improbable Research web site: www.improbable.com.

NUTRITION PRIZE

Massimiliano Zampini of the University of Trento, Italy and Charles Spence of Oxford University, U.K., for electronically modifying the sound of a potato chip to make the person chewing the chip believe it to be crisper and fresher than it really is.

REFERENCE: “The Role of Auditory Cues in Modulating the Perceived Crispness and Staleness of Potato Chips,” Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence, Journal of Sensory Studies, vol. 19, October 2004, pp. 347-63.

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Massimiliano Zampini. unable to attend the ceremony, was presented with the prize at a special ceremony, later in the month, at the Genoa Science Festival.

PEACE PRIZE

The Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology (ECNH) and the citizens of Switzerland for adopting the legal principle that plants have dignity.

REFERENCE: “The Dignity of Living Beings With Regard to Plants: Moral Consideration of Plants for Their Own Sake.” <http://www.ekah.admin.ch/en/topics/dignity-of-creation/index.html>

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Urs Thurnherr, member of the committee.

ARCHAEOLOGY PRIZE

Astolfo G. Mello Araujo and José Carlos Marcelino of Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil, for measuring how the course of history, or at least the contents of an archaeological dig site, can be scrambled by the actions of a live armadillo.

REFERENCE: “The Role of Armadillos in the Movement of Archaeological Materials: An Experimental Approach,” Astolfo G. Mello Araujo and José Carlos Marcelino, Geoarchaeology, vol. 18, no. 4, April 2003, pp. 433–60.

BIOLOGY PRIZE

Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert, and Michel Franc of Ecole Nationale Veterinaire de Toulouse, France for discovering that the fleas that live on a dog can jump higher than the fleas that live on a cat.

REFERENCE: “A Comparison of Jump Performances of the Dog Flea, Ctenocephalides canis (Curtis, 1826) and the Cat Flea, Ctenocephalides felis felis (Bouche, 1835),” M.C. Cadiergues, C. Joubert, and M. Franc, Veterinary Parasitology, vol. 92, no. 3, October 1, 2000, pp. 239–41.

ADDITIONAL NOTE: Professor Cadiergues is a former Resident in Dermatology at the Royal Veterinary College, London, U.K..

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Marie-Christine Cadiergues and Christel Joubert, unable to attend the ceremony, were presented with the prize at a special ceremony, later in the month, at the Genoa Science Festival.

MEDICINE PRIZE

Dan Ariely of Duke University (USA), Rebecca L. Waber of MIT (USA), Baba Shiv of Stanford University (USA), and Ziv Carmon of INSEAD (Singapore) for demonstrating that high-priced fake medicine is more effective than low-priced fake medicine.

REFERENCE: “Commercial Features of Placebo and Therapeutic Efficacy,” Rebecca L. Waber, Baba Shiv, Ziv Carmon, and Dan Ariely, Journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 299, March 5, 2008, pp. 1016–7.

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Dan Ariely.

COGNITIVE SCIENCE PRIZE

Toshiyuki Nakagaki of Hokkaido University, Japan, Hiroyasu Yamada of Nagoya, Japan, Ryo Kobayashi of Hiroshima University, Atsushi Tero of Presto JST, Akio Ishiguro of Tohoku University, and Ágotá Tóth of the University of Szeged, Hungary, for discovering that slime molds can solve puzzles.

REFERENCE: “Intelligence: Maze-Solving by an Amoeboid Organism,” Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Hiroyasu Yamada, and Ágota Tóth, Nature, vol. 407, September 2000, p. 470.

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Ryo Kobayashi, and Atsushi Tero.

ECONOMICS PRIZE

Geoffrey Miller, Joshua Tybur, and Brent Jordan of the University of New Mexico, USA, for discovering that professional lap dancers earn higher tips when they are ovulating.

REFERENCE: “Ovulatory Cycle Effects on Tip Earnings by Lap Dancers: Economic Evidence for Human Estrus?”, Geoffrey Miller, Joshua M. Tybur, and Brent D. Jordan, Evolution and Human Behavior, vol. 28, 2007, pp. 375–81.

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Geoffrey Miller and Brent Jordan.

PHYSICS PRIZE

Dorian Raymer of the Ocean Observatories Initiative at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, USA, and Douglas Smith of the University of California, San Diego, USA, for proving mathematically that heaps of string or hair or almost anything else will inevitably tangle themselves up in knots.

REFERENCE: “Spontaneous Knotting of an Agitated String,” Dorian M. Raymer and Douglas E. Smith, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 104, no. 42, October 16, 2007, pp. 16432–7.

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Dorian Raymer.

CHEMISTRY PRIZE

Sharee A. Umpierre of the University of Puerto Rico, Joseph A. Hill of The Fertility Centers of New England (USA), Deborah J. Anderson of Boston University School of Medicine and Harvard Medical School (USA), for discovering that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide, and Chuang-Ye Hong of Taipei Medical University (Taiwan), C.C. Shieh, P. Wu, and B.N. Chiang (all of Taiwan) for discovering that it is not.

REFERENCE: “Effect of ‘Coke’ on Sperm Motility,” Sharee A. Umpierre, Joseph A. Hill, and Deborah J. Anderson, New England Journal of Medicine, 1985, vol. 313, no. 21, p. 1351.

REFERENCE: “The Spermicidal Potency of Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola,” C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu, and B.N. Chiang, Human Toxicology, vol. 6, no. 5, September 1987, pp. 395–6. [NOTE: The journal is now called “Human and Experimental Toxicology.”]

WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Deborah Anderson, and C.Y. Hong’s daughter Wan Hong.

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The Ig Nobel Acceptance Speeches

transcribed by Judy Bemis

NOTE: To see video of these speeches, and of the entire ceremony, see the Improbable Research web site: www.improbable.com.

The winners of seven of this year’s ten prizes were able to travel, at their own expense, to the ceremony at Sanders Theatre. Here are their acceptance speeches.

The winners of the Biology Prize and the Nutrition Prize had planned to come, but circumstance in each case prevented it happening. Happily, three weeks later, Biology Prize co-winners Marie-Christine Cadiergues and Christel Joubel, and Nutrition Prize co-winner Massimiliano Zampini were all able to come to the Genoa Science Festival, where they were presented with their Ig Nobel Prizes. Medicine Prize co-winner Dan Ariely took part in both the regular Ig Nobel Ceremony and the special ceremony in Italy. (For details, see “A Special Ceremony in Genoa” in this issue.)

Miss Sweetie Poo helps Medicine Prize co-winner. Dan Ariely finish his acceptance speech in a timely manner. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

Medicine
Dan Ariely (“high-priced fake medicine is more effective than low-priced fake medicine”)

Twelve years ago, I sat around that corner and I was in my last year of graduate studies, and I was inspired by the people who were getting awards on this stage. And I knew that one day I wanted to be like them too. So I took a job at MIT, and I worked very hard. I produced a lot of studies that I thought would win me the IgNobel award—in fact, I wrote a whole book (brandishes book) that I thought should have won me this prize. One year in particular, I wrote a paper on how men, when they masturbate and get aroused, make different decisions, and I thought that would surely get me the award. But no. So I am extremely pleased to get the award today for this prize. My only problem is that I don’t know once I reach this peak, what else could I strive for? So thank you very much. I also want to thank some other people, of course. First of all, I want to thank my wife. It’s very hard to be married to me, I’m realizing that after awhile. [At this point Miss Sweetie Poo interrupted, saying “Please stop, I’m bored.”] I want to thank Bronwyn. [“Please stop, I’m bored.”] My third grade teacher was always very supportive of me, [“Please stop, I’m bored.”] and I want to appreciate her. Are you really bored? Are you really bored? [“Please stop, I’m bored.”] Thank you very much.

Urs Thurnherr accepts the Peace Prize on behalf of his committee, which was charged with making sense of the legal principle that plants have dignity, and also of all the (approximately) seven million citizens of Switzerland, who as a nation have adopted the principle . Photo: David Holzman.

Peace
Urs Thurnherr, member of the Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology [ECNH] (“adopting the legal principle that plants have dignity”)

Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the ECNH, I would like to thank you sincerely for awarding us an Ig Nobel Prize for our study on the dignity of living beings with regards to plants, and thereby throwing attention to the topic of plant life. Our study is a product of the Committee’s mandate and is to be understood against a background of the Swiss Federal Constitution. It’s certainly understandable that an enterprise concerned with the question of the dignity of plants should first make you laugh, but, have you ever forgotten to water one of your house plants and then had to throw it away? Did that make you feel uneasy in any way? If so, when you can already relate to this subject, and you might even be tempted to read our study of today’s event. Once again, many thanks.

Three of the six co-winners of the Cognitive Science Prize traveled to the ceremony.Here Atsushi Tero displays his certificate, Toshiyuki Nakagaki holds the team’s prize and Ryo Kobayashi smiles gently for the camera. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Cognitive Science
Toshiyuki Nakagaki (“slime molds can solve puzzles”)

Ladies and Gentlemen, good evening. So, in the most standard dictionary of Japanese language, Kojien, we can find the word “single-celled” which means “almost stupid.” But, so now is the time to say “Objection!” So slime molds, a single-celled organism, is much smarter than we usually thought. So that’s true. Thank you for your attention.

Economics Prize winners Geoffrey Miller and Brent Jordan emerge from the sacred curtain to shake hands with William Lipscomb. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Economics
Geoffrey Miller and Brent Jordan (“lap dancers earn higher tips when they are ovulating”)

JORDAN: When I first mentioned to my colleagues in the Gentleman’s Club that I was going to turn it into science, they laughed at me. And when I went to the University and said the same thing, a lot of people laughed at me. But when I showed them the results, they quit laughing. Oh, and gentlemen, I am not taking any applications for research assistants. And now my colleague.

MILLER: Scientists can learn a lot from lap dancers. Not just how to extract more money from students, politicians, and university administrators, but also about human nature. I make about $70,000 a year teaching basic human sexuality to the earnest but often stoned youth of New Mexico. A good lap dancer makes about $140,000 a year giving remedial sex education to married but often tipsy middle-aged males. Yet we know one technique the lap dancers don’t: hierarchical linear modeling of time-series data. Where they saw random fluctuations in day-to-day earnings, we could see that their income peaked just before ovulation, at the point of maximum fertility. So lap dancers now can schedule their work shifts to match their fertility and now make about $200,000 a year. [At this point Miss Sweetie Poo interrupted, saying “Please stop, I’m bored.”] And we get the Ig Nobel, which is beyond all price. [“Please stop, I’m bored.”] Thank you.

2008 Ig Nobel Literature Prize winner David (“You Bastard”) Sims accepts congratulations from 2007 Medicine Prize co-winner Dan (“Sword-Swallowing and Its Side Effects”) Meyer. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Literature
David Sims (“You Bastard: A Narrative Exploration of the Experience of Indignation within Organizations.”)

Of course, I understand we’re all different. But I can’t work out where you’re coming from. You probably have your reason for doing what you’re doing, and in some parallel universe you might be right. I’m a very liberal person, accustomed to seeing other peoples’ viewpoints, and that makes it all the more strange that I can’t see yours. What sort of character are you? I just can’t make any sense of what you’re doing. I can’t imagine what sort of story you think you’re living out. Don’t get me wrong, I realize you might just be very stupid—but that stupid? As it happens, I’m one of the good guys. We defeat the bad guys; that’s how we know we’re the good guys. If that hurts, then so be it; you’ve brought it on yourself. You’ve forced me into seeing you in a way that I don’t really approve of, and that makes me even more angry. You Bastard!

Dorian Raymer accepts the Physics Prize. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Physics
Dorian Raymer (“string inevitable gets tangled”)

I have to do a twitter really quick: “Accepting Ig Nobel.” Yeah. Does anyone know what twitter is? I just twittered. Um, sorry, it’s kinda rude. We were supposed to have two people. Doug Smith is the other person, but they thought that would be kind of redundant. Anyways, it’s a lot harder to talk when you’re standing up here. I never thought that this would—well, never more than like two or three times—thought that this would happen, but it’s kinda like that guy Dan said, it has. And, oh yeah, I was going to say Doug was tied up—in a knot. Anyways, now that this has happened, I guess anything can happen, so thank you. And on behalf of Doug, thank you, too. And I wish Doug the best. And if everything goes as planned, I will see you at the Oscars.

Wan Hong delivers the Chemistry Prize acceptance speech on behalf of her father, Dr. Chuang-Ye Hong, whose team found experimentally that Coca-Cola is not an effective spermicide. (Dr. Deborah Anderson, leader of the team that shared the prize, spoke on behalf of herself and her colleagues. Her photo appears on the front cover of this issue.) Photo: Kees Moeliker.

Chemistry
Deborah J. Anderson (“Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide”)

Well, I’d like to start by thanking the Ig Nobel prize committee for recognizing our seminal research paper, after 22 years. It was published in 1985, so I’m very honored. And I’d like to thank my co-authors, Dr. Hill, who provided the biological materials for our study, and Dr. Sharee Umpierre, who planted the seed for our project by mentioning one day in the lab that sexually active girls in her convent school in Puerto Rico used Coca-Cola douches for birth control. We had to do the study, and we showed that when Coca-Cola is added in excess to human semen, it kills the sperm within one minute. And you can hear more details at MIT on Saturday, we’ll go into the details there. But we also know in our lab that sperm can be clocked going more than 18 centimeters an hour, so accurately placed sperm could make it into the cervical canal before the douche formulation could take effect. So we don’t recommend douching for contraception.

Wan Hong, on behalf of her father, Chuang-Ye Hong (“no, it’s not”)

Hi. My dad would like to say thank you from Taipei, Taiwan. He can’t be here today, but he says “thanks for giving me an award that makes me look really, really cool in my daughter’s eyes.” And I would like to say thanks Mom and Dad for firmly believing it won’t work and didn’t try it so I’m here today. It’s precisely in 1984 that they tried. Thank you very much and congratulations to everybody. Thank you.

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An Ig Nobel Tribute to Coca-Cola

by Nan Swift, Improbable Research staff

The 2008 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony included a special tribute to Coca-Cola, in honor of the Chemistry Prize–winning studies. The prize was awarded to two teams of scientists, one for discovering that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide, the other for discovering that it is not. Their studies are:

“Effect of ‘Coke’ on Sperm Motility,” Sharee A. Umpierre, Joseph A. Hill, and Deborah J. Anderson, New England Journal of Medicine, 1985, vol. 313, no. 21, p. 1351.

“The Spermicidal Potency of Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola,” C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu, and B.N. Chiang, Human Toxicology, vol. 6, no. 5, September 1987, pp. 395–6.

These images were projected above the stage in Sanders Theatre while the Chemistry Prize acceptance speeches were being delivered. Each is a Coca-Cola advertisement. Taken together, they perhaps shed new insights on the substance and on the marketing campaigns conducted over many decades by its manufacturer.

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Ig Nobel & Improbable Research BOOKS!

The world’s most untranslatable books have (some of them) been translated into CHINESE, GERMAN, ITALIAN, SPANISH, JAPANESE, DUTCH, POLISH, FRENCH, and other languages including, to some extent, the original ENGLISH.

The newest: “The Man Who Tried to Clone Himself.”

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The 24-7 Lectures

transcribed by Stephen Drew and Judy Bemis

As part of the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, three of the world’s great thinkers were invited to give 24/7 Lectures.

Each 24/7 Lecture was on an assigned topic. The lecturer was asked to explain that topic twice:

FIRST, a complete technical description in TWENTY-FOUR (24) SECONDS;

and THEN a clear summary that anyone can understand, in SEVEN (7) WORDS.

The time and word limits were enforced by the Ig Nobel referee, Mr. John Barrett, and the Ig Nobel V-Chip Monitor, prominent New York attorney William J. Maloney.

Here are the complete transcripts of this year’s 24-7 Lectures.

Anna Lysyanskaya. Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

LECTURER: Anna Lysyanskaya, Associate Professor of Computer Science at Brown University.
TOPIC: Cryptography.

Complete technical description in TWENTY-FOUR (24) SECONDS:

A cryptographic system is secure if no matter what probabilistic polynomial-time algorithm the bad guys are using, they still can’t hurt the good guys. To prove security, we typically relate the computational complexity of launching an attack to that of a computational task known or believed to be impossible. Although for certain scenarios, unconditionally secure solutions exist, security of others relies on established complexity-theoretic assumptions.

Clear summary that anyone can understand, in SEVEN (7) WORDS:

It ain’t secure till you prove it.

Dany Adams. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

LECTURER: Dany Adams, Biologist at The Forsyth Center for Regenerative and Developmental Biology.
TOPIC: Biology.
Complete technical description in TWENTY-FOUR (24) SECONDS:

At the molecular level, proteins can act as surrogates. For example, two wingless receptors, Frizzled and Dfrizzled2, can function redundantly upstream of the Armadillo gene,1 while regulation of the ARMADILLO protein is by the redundantly acting Src64 and Src 42A.2 At the organismal level, the reproductive strategy of the nine-banded armadillo also exploits redundancy: females invariably give birth to identical quadruplets.3

Clear summary that anyone can understand, in SEVEN (7) WORDS:

The armadillo’s lesson: have a plan B.

NOTE: Dr. Adams later sent us references for her lecture:

1. “Frizzled and Dfrizzled-2 Function as Redundant Receptors for Wingless During Drosophila Embryonic Development,” P. Bhanot, M. Fish, J.A. Jemison, R. Nusse, J. Nathans and K.M. Cadigan, Development, vol. 126, no. 18, 1999, pp. 4175–86.

2. “Requirements of Genetic Interactions Between Src42A, armadillo and shotgun, a Gene Encoding E-cadherin, for Normal Development in Drosophila,” Mayuko Takahashi, Fumitaka Takahashi, Kumiko Ui-Tei, Tetsuya Kojima, and Kaoru Saigo, Development, vol. 132, no. 11, 2005, pp. 2547–59.

3. “Heredity and Organic Symmetry in Armadillo Quadruplets,” H.H. Newman, Biology Bulletin, vol. 24, no. 1, 1915, p. 1.

William Lipscomb. Photo: Kees Moeliker.

LECTURER: William Lipscomb, Nobel Laureate (1976) in Chemistry.
TOPIC: Redundancy.

Complete technical description in TWENTY-FOUR (24) SECONDS:

Redundancy. Exceeding what is unnecessary. Superfluous, verbose. You find this throughout, and yet the content is not there, but the content is always there.

Clear summary that anyone can understand, in SEVEN (7) WORDS:

The source of real original thought is not present in the definition of redundancy.

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Libretto: “Redundancy, Again”

A mini-opera in three acts
Music by Stephen Foster, Charles B. Ward and Samuel A. Ward
Words by Marc Abrahams

Photo: Alexey Eliseev.

Original Cast
Opera Conductor: David Stockton
Pianist: Branden Grimmett
Tweedle: Maria Ferrante
Dee: Ben Sears
Guards: Roberta Gilbert and Robert Canterbury
Employees: the other scientists and other Ig Nobel Prize winners
Consultants: Nobel Laureate William Lipscomb, Benoit Mandelbrot (creator of the concept of fractals)
Flutist: Laura Hamel
Accordianist: Thomas Michel
The Ig Fife and Drum and Drum and Bugle and Bugle and Bugle and Accordion Corps
Costumes by Robert Canterbury.

ACT 1—”Keep it simple just in time”

NARRATOR [SPOKEN]: Tonight’s opera is about two business partners—identical twins named Tweedle and Dee. Not that it matters, but Tweedle and Dee sell trimming equipment to hedge funds. To survive in the global economy, Tweedle and Dee want to be as efficient as possible. So to be as efficient as possible—to maximize efficiency, and do it efficiently—they decide to... eliminate redundancy! They are going to fire everyone whose job in anyway overlaps anyone else’s job. Let’s join Tweedle and Dee as they celebrate this by announcing it to everybody in their company:

[MUSIC: “I Dream of Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair,” Stephen Foster]
[TWEEDLE and DEE sing this, alternating verses]

Just keep it simple. Simply take our advice.
No duplication. Never do things twice.
Yes, keep it simple. Simply take our advice.
Do not duplicate. No, do not do things twice.

Two times is too many, and three is even worse.
Fortune favors those who don’t needlessly rehearse.
Just once. Just once is all that you’ll ever need.
Once you understand that, you’re at-least-twice-as-likely-to-succeed.

[NOTE THE INTENTIONAL AWKWARD-EXTRA-SYLLABLES-AT-THE-END!]

But wait!!! Do nothing if it’s not just-in-time.
“Wait—[BE SILENT FOR A BEAT]—then hurry!” That’s our paradigm!
Yes, wait!!! Do nothing if it’s not just-in-time.
“Wait—[BE SILENT FOR A BEAT]—then hurry!” Yes, that’s our paradigm!

When you do things early, you then have time to waste.
That’s why you should wait—[BE SILENT FOR A BEAT]—then do those things in haste.
Please be efficient. That is what you must be.
If you are efficient, you have efficiency.

Photo: David Holzman.

Become efficient: Don’t waste time watching clocks.
Old ways are wasteful. Don’t be orthodox.
Consult a clock, but never just on a hunch. [LOOKS AT WATCH, AND PERKS UP]
Oh now, look at that!!! Hey, it’s time now for lunch!!!

So much of the time, any clock is just a frill.
Simply voyeurism, a momentary thrill.
The time one spends in staring down at one’s watch
Is no more productive than the-time-spent-looking-at-one’s-crotch.

[NOTE THE INTENTIONAL AWKWARD-EXTRA-SYLLABLES-AT-THE-END!]

Avoid redundancy. No need to repeat.
Say what needs saying. Keep it short and sweet.
Avoid redundancy. No need to repeat.
Just say what you must. Keep it short. Keep it sweet.

Never be redundant. Do not redundant be!
No, don’t be redundant! No! No redundancy!
Don’t be redundant. Promise me!!! Promise me!!!
No, don’t be redundant! No! Never be redundant!

[NOTE THE INTENTIONAL AWKWARD-EXTRA-SYLLABLE--AND INTENTIONAL-LACK-OF-RHYME-AT-THE-END!]

ACT 2—”Redundancy”

NARRATOR [SPOKEN]: When last we saw Tweedle and Dee, they fired everyone who was redundant. (Please note that to anyone who speaks British English, that statement is itself redundant. If you’re not British, you may disagree. Whatever...) Now it’s a month later. A minor problem keeps cropping up. Now whenever even one employee quits, the entire operation grinds to a halt—because no one knows anyone else’s job. Let’s join Tweedle and Dee as try to solve this vexatious problem.

[MUSIC: “The Band Played On,” by Charles B. Ward]
[TWEEDLE and DEE sing this, alternating verses]

On Monday our receptionist
Resigned. He lives alone.
Now nobody knows how to work the phone.
On Tuesday our top techie
Took a trip to watch a whale.
Now none of us can access our email.
The next day Dave the doorman
Drove down to see the shore.
Now no one knows how to unlock the door.
Whenever someone quits, or just stays home to weep and sob,
We’re stuck ’cause no one knows each other’s job.

Soooo, mayyyyy-beeee...

Photo: Kees Moeliker.

[CHORUS]
Here’s what we need
If we are to succeed—
It’s redundancy!
Things would work out swell
If all our personnel
Had redundancy.
Duplication feels clannish,
But when someone vanish-
-es, just that ONE person’s not there!
That’s better—NOT worse’n—
An absence of person.
Redundancy!

Soooo... youuuu... meeeean...

[CHORUS]
Each of us blows
Through a two-sided nose.
That’s redundancy.
Most medical probes
Prove our brains have two lobes.
That’s redundancy.
And if I should propose that *I KNOW* what *YOU KNOW*,
And if you made me *SHOW* that I know...
Well, then we’d *BOTH* know that *I* know what *YOU* know.
That’s redundancy.

Thaaaat’s... suuuu-btllllle...

[REPEAT THE CHORUS TOGETHER, AND FASTER]

ACT 3—”Redundancy, Again”

NARRATOR [SPOKEN]: Tweedle and Dee hired two sets of consultants. One set of consultants recommended that the company be very sure to have, yes, redundancy again. The second set of consultants recommended the same thing. Let’s join Tweedle and Dee and all the consultants—played here by the Nobel Laureates—as they celebrate their brilliant work, again and again. Yes, let’s join Tweedle and Dee and all the consultants—played here by the Nobel Laureates—as they celebrate their brilliant work, again and again.

Photo: Kees Moeliker.

[MUSIC: “America the Beautiful” by Samuel A. Ward]
[TWEEDLE and DEE sing this, alternating verses]

Contingencies! Contingencies!
I planned out each detail.
Anticipate-
-ed, calculate-
ed so it could not fail.

[CHORUS]
Efficiency! Efficiency!
I always would demand
That ev’ry day
In ev’ry way
Things always go as planned.

Inexplicably! Inexplicably!
We had some little hitch.
Some bottleneck
Some iperfec-
-shun. Oh, some tiny glitch...

[CHORUS]
Catastrophe! Catastrophe!
Despite a wonderful-amazing-brilliant start,
[NOTE THE INTENTIONAL AWKWARD-EXTRA-SYLLABLES]
Some little ding
Doomed everything.
The whole thing fell apart.

Capriciousness! Capriciousness!
That’s how the whole world works!
You can’t coerce
The universe.
It’s got its little quirks.

[CHORUS]
Redundancy! Redundancy!
This word you may perchance
Have learned in school,
Or ’cause you’re cool,
Or just by happenstance.

Redundancy! Redundancy!
Redundancy’s our friend.
Those extra bits
Have benefits
Upon which we depend.

[CHORUS]
Redundancy! Redundancy!
Redundancy again!
Don’t count on luck,
Or you’ll get stuck!
Redundancy again!

TWEEDLE or DEE: [SPOKEN] One more time!

[CHORUS]
Redundancy! Redundancy!
Redundancy again!
Don’t count on luck,
Or you’ll get stuck!
Redundancy again!

TWEEDLE or DEE: [SPOKEN] No more times!

DEE or TWEEDLE: [SPOKEN] No more times!

---

Boys Will Be Boys

Research by and for adolescent males of all ages and sexes
compiled by Katherine Lee, Improbable Research staff

Rectal Salami
“Rectal Salami,” J. Shah, A. Majed, and D. Rosin, International Journal of Clinical Practice, vol. 56, no. 7, September 2002, pp. 558–9. (Thanks to Prentiss Lang for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at St Mary’s Hospital, London, U.K., explain:

We present the case of a 63-year-old man who had inserted a salami into his anal canal for sexual stimulation—the commonest reason for inserting foreign bodies—and who subsequently required a laparotomy for its removal.

Boink in Bloom
“Orchid Sexual Deceit Provokes Ejaculation,” A.C. Gaskett, C.G. Winnick and M.E. Herberstein, American Nauralist, vol. 171, 2008, pp. E206–E212, DOI:10.1086/587532. (Thanks to Scott Langill for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at Macquarie University and at the University of Sydney, Australia, report:

Sexually deceptive orchids lure pollinators by mimicking female insects. Male insects fooled into gripping or copulating with orchids unwittingly transfer the pollinia. The effect of deception on pollinators has been considered negligible, but we show that pollinators may suffer considerable costs. Insects pollinating Australian tongue orchids (Cryptostylis species) frequently ejaculate and waste copious sperm. The costs of sperm wastage could select for pollinator avoidance of orchids, thereby driving and maintaining sexual deception via antagonistic coevolution or an arms race between pollinator learning and escalating orchid mimicry. However, we also show that orchid species provoking such extreme pollinator behavior have the highest pollination success.

Fish-Recommended Dinosaur Necking
“Necks for Sex: Sexual Selection as an Explanation for Sauropod Dinosaur Neck Elongation,” Phil Senter, Journal of Zoology, vol. 271, no. 1, January 2007. pp. 45–53, DOI:10.1111/j.1469-7998.2006.00197.x. (Thanks to Frank Fish for bringing this to our attention.) The author, at Lamar State College at Orange, Texas, explains:

The immensely long neck of a sauropod is one of the most familiar and striking of anatomical specializations among dinosaurs. Here, I use recently collected neontological and paleontological information to test the predictions of two competing hypotheses proposed to explain the significance of the long neck. According to the traditional hypothesis, neck elongation in sauropods increased feeding height, thereby reducing competition with contemporaries for food. According to the other hypothesis, which is advanced for the first time here, neck elongation in sauropods was driven by sexual selection. Available data match the predictions of the sexual selection hypothesis and contradict the predictions of the feeding competition hypothesis. It is therefore more plausible that increases in sauropod neck lengths were driven by sexual selection than by competition for foliage.

Why Romeo Is a Runt
“Climbing to Reach Females: Romeo Should Be Small,” Jordi Moya-Laraño, Juraj Halaj, and David H. Wise, Evolution, vol. 56, no. 2, February 2002, pp. 420–5. The authors, at the University of Kentucky, report:

The race for reaching mates by the time they are receptive, or sexual selection by scramble competition, has received little attention. We argue that smaller males are favored in species in which the male must climb to reach females located in high habitat patches. This new explanation we term the “gravity hypothesis” of sexual size dimorphism (SSD)....

In reaching high habitats, smaller, faster searchers will be favored either through sexual selection by scramble competition and/or by escaping predation easier by running faster on vertical surfaces. Different spider species are found at a wide range of heights. We compiled a dataset of spider taxa and arranged their habitats according to four height categories, ranked from soil surface to trees. We show that, after controlling for phylogeny, both predictions of the gravity hypothesis of SSD are met.

Public Lice on Unusual Pastures
“Phthirus Pubis on Unusual Pastures” [article in Dutch], A.W. Thöne and H.J. van der Kaay, Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde, vol. 121, no. 22, May 28, 1977, pp. 895–6.

Chinese Bra Revolution
“Development of a New Chinese Bra Sizing System Based on Breast Anthropometric Measurements,” Rong Zhenga, Winnie Yu, and Jintu Fana, International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, vol. 37, no. 8, August 2007, pp. 697–705. (Thanks to Kristine Danowski for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, report:

Since 1935, the bra sizing system has been based on bust girth and underbust girth. Woman’s breast is however a very complex 3D geometry, the existing sizing system based on just two girth measurements may be inappropriate in the categorization of breast sizes for bras. Through analyzing the nude breast measurements from 456 subjects aged between 20 and 39, we hereby propose a new bra sizing system for Chinese women.

Penile Zipper Entrapment Update
“Safe and Painless Manipulation of Penile Zipper Entrapment,” Satish Chandra Mishra, Indian Pediatrics, vol. 43, 2006, pp. 252–4. (Thanks to Larry Gettleman for bringing this to our attention.) The author, at NDMC Charak Palika Hospital, New Delhi, India, cites the Ig Nobel Prize–winning 1990 study “Acute Management of the Zipper Entrapped Penis,” and explains:

Entrapment of prepuce in a zipper is a common cause of prepuceal injury in children. The reported interventions include dismantling the zipper with bone or wire cutters, to circumcision. A quick, simple and non-traumatic approach to the zipper manipulation is presented in which prepuce is instantly released by lateral compression of the zip fastener, using a pliers.

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AIR 12:2—Painting Issue.
AIR 12:3—Fish & Chips Issue.
AIR 12:4—The Issue. SOLD OUT
AIR 12:5—Anatomy Issue. SOLD OUT
AIR 12:6—Ig Nobel Issue.

AIR 13:1—Coke & Pepsi & Coli Issue.
AIR 13:2—Theoretical Figures Issue.
AIR 13:3—Rivalry Issue.
AIR 13:4—What’s in Your Head Issue.
AIR 13:5—Meaning of the Finger Issue.
AIR 13:6—Ig Nobel Issue.

AIR 14:1—Reclassification/Renaming Issue.
AIR 14:2—Writing Research Issue.
AIR 14:3—Anti-Terrorism Issue.
AIR 14:4—Colorful Research Issue.
AIR 14:5—Dots and Spots Issue.

Teachers: You have our permission—and encouragement— to photocopy AIR articles and hand them out in your classroom.

ONE COPY-----USA $9, elsewhere $11 (includes shipping)
MULTIPLE -----USA $7, elsewhere $9 (includes shipping)

Downloadable PDFs of many back issues (and the tables-of-contents of *every* issue) are available on our web site www.improbable.com

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