Improbable Research

The influence of Harry Potter spreads deeper:

“Defense Against the Dark Arts,” Mark W. Bailey, Clark L. Coleman and Jack W. Davidson, Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education archive, Proceedings of the 39th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education, Portland, OR, USA, 2008, pp. 315-319. The authors, at Hamilton College, Clinton, NY and at the University of Virginia, report:

“To avoid the controversy associated with teaching students how to write malicious software, we focused the course on techniques for defending against viruses, so we named the course Defense Against the Dark Arts.”

Nowadays, space in cemeteries is at a premium. Therefore, if a method could be found to pack more of the deceased into a given area – money could be saved.
The problem may have been resolved with the invention of the ‘Easy Inter Burial Container‘ recently patented by Californian  inventor Donald Scruggs.
The patent can be viewed here (Click the Full Text button to view the Full Text)

The Arab Times and other media report on a difficulty of language involving a diplomat named Akbar Zib (or, in some spellings, Akber Zeb). Mr. Zib (or Zeb) appears in the photo below, in the middle, clasping his hands over his groin. Here’s a report from the Salem News:

Saudi’s Reject Pakistani Diplomat Whose Name Translates to ‘Biggest Dick

A high level Pakistani diplomat has been rejected as Ambassador of Saudi Arabia because his name, Akbar Zib, equates to “Biggest Dick” in Arabic. Saudi officials,

Income and orgasms are statistical food for thought, thanks to Pollet and Nettle:

“Partner Wealth Predicts Self-Reported Orgasm Frequency in a Sample of Chinese Women,” Thomas V. Pollet and Daniel Nettle, Evolution and Human Behavior, vol. 30, no. 2, March 2009, pp. 146-151. (Thanks to Ig Nobel Prize winner Francis Fesmire for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at Newcastle University, report:

“We investigated the relationship between women’s self-reported orgasm frequency and the characteristics of their partners in a large representative sample from the Chinese Health and Family Life Survey. We found that women report more frequent orgasms the higher their partner’s income is.”

This three-minute video, which focuses on sheep and politicians, is a good tool for classroom discussions and experiments in the field of abnormal psychology. [NOTE: Students should be informed that the video was designed and is being used for a different sort of experiment — a campaign advertisement in which one one candidate is attacking another. Both candidates aspire to be governor of the American state of California.]

Paul Raeburn writes, in the Knight Science Journalism Tracker:

It’s gripping TV, there’s no question about it. The Today Show, with its new medical correspondent, Dr. Nancy Snyderman, launched a week-long series Monday showing patients undergoing surgical procedures live on television. In the first episode, Dr. Nancy (as [Today Show host] Meredith Viera calls her; ugh) sits with a physician while he manipulates a remote-controlled catheter inside the heart of a patient with atrial fibrillation….

What makes it gripping is not the visuals, but the possibility that the patient might die on live television. Wouldn’t that be exciting?