Improbable Research

Newspapers today, as prognosticated by T. Baron Russell in 1906 in his book A Hundred Years Hence:

the regeneration of the newspaper will be forced upon the newspaper-office by the development of public intelligence.…

a well-informed public will resent obvious garbling or clearly unfair selection. The newspaper reader will no longer (as now) want only to hear what is said on a side more or less emotionally and hardly at all reflectively embraced. He will want to know what is said on all sides, and will make up his own mind, instead of swallowing whole the printed opinions, real or momentarily assumed, of other people.

War today, as prognosticated by T. Baron Russell in 1906 in his book A Hundred Years Hence:

we may take it as quite certain that war as an institution will be as obsolete as gladiators in the year 2000. Even if the increasing amenity of the human race did not abolish war, two other things would be certain to do so. One is the enormous development, already clearly in sight, of the means of destruction : the other the revolt of the peoples against the stupendous cost, not merely or chiefly in time of war, but also in time of peace, of modern armaments. The rising tide of educated democracy must inevitably banish war.

Advertising today, as prognosticated by T. Baron Russell in 1906 in his book  A Hundred Years Hence:

advertising will in the future world become gradually more and more intelligent in tone. It will seek to influence demand by argument instead of clamour, a tendency already more apparent every year. Cheap attention-calling tricks and clap-trap will be wholly replaced, as they are already being greatly replaced, by serious exposition; and advertisements, instead of being mere repetitions of stale catch-words, will be made interesting and informative, so that they will be welcomed instead of being shunned; and it will be just as suicidal for a manufacturer to publish silly or fallacious claims to notoriety as for a shopkeeper of the present day to seek custom by telling lies to his customers.

Charles Keating, an American financier whose accomplishments later came under intense public investigation, conducted an intense public investigation of pornography. Keating distilled his findings into this video. It remains a model for researchers who would like to emulate the Keating method of analysis and exposition:

NBC broadcast this quasi-intimate tribute to Bijan Pakzad, who was awarded the 1995 Ig Nobel Prize in chemistry for creating DNA Cologne and DNA Perfume, neither of which contain deoxyribonucleic acid, and both of which come in a triple helix bottle.

This month’s Dr. Suckfüll of the Month is Prof. Dr. med. Markus Suckfüll.

He is Chefarzt der Klinik at Krankenhaus Martha-Maria in München, Germany, and author of the popular “Emergencies in general practice, 4. Sudden deafness: follow the guidelines,” [M. Suckfüll, MMW Fortschr Med. 2001 Mar 1;143(9):37-9] and numerous other studies.

(Thanks to investigator Rose Fox for bringing this to our attention.)