When a stranger says he wants to dig up a corpse that might be buried beneath the pews of your church, should you let him? Would it help if he explains that: (a) he recently dug up a corpse on the other side of an ocean; and (b) he’s not certain who that foreign corpse […]
Month: May 2007
Russian Ig book
The Russian edition of the first Ig Nobel Prizes book has just been published. Its ISBN is 5-17-030356-4. The publisher is AST.
Chicken chicken, continued
Chicken Chicken Chicken Chicken (the academic study), published in the Annals of Improbable Research, vol. 12, no. 5, September-October 2006, led to Chicken Chicken Chicken Chicken (the lecture). Doug Zongker distilled his research into a five minute presentation, which he presented at the Improbable Research session of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s annual meeting […]
Mary Baker joins the LFHCfS
Mary Baker has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. Kim Keeton, who nominated her, says: Mary received a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California at Berkeley in 1994. Her research interests include distributed systems, networks, mobile systems, security, and digital preservation. Before coming to HP Labs she was on the […]
Kim Keeton joins LFHCfS
Kim Keeton has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. Mary Baker, who nominated her, says: Kim received a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California at Berkeley in 1999. Her research interests include the design, implementation and analysis of data-intensive computing systems, both in local and distributed environments. In particular, she […]
A slimmer, trimmer Troy suit
Here’s more info, from a bit back, about the suit that Troy Hurtubise put up for auction not so long ago: The grizzly man is back, and this time he’s ready to take on bullets and bombs. Troy Hurtubise, the Hamilton-born inventor who became famous for his bulky bear-protection suit by standing in front of […]
Five-second, with and without background
The five-second rule is back in the news, its recent scientific history sometimes acknowledged, sometimes not: The Five-Second Rule Explored, or How Dirty Is That Bologna? A COUPLE of weeks ago I saw a new scientific paper from Clemson University that struck me as both pioneering and hilarious. Accompanied by six graphs, two tables and […]
The best way to waste time
Critics say modern philosophy is a useless waste of time. They are wrong. At its best, modern philosophy tells us how to waste time usefully. Philosophy’s great recent achievement, in this respect and perhaps overall, is the theory of structured procrastination. In a 1995 paper, Structured Procrastination, John Perry, a professor of philosophy at Stanford […]
To close the word gap: ?1bn
Education Secretary Alan Johnson is to push for new targets to close the attainment gap between disadvantaged and more affluent pupils. The Labour deputy leadership contender will say he wants an extra ?1bn spent on closing this gap by 2011. In a speech later, he will say research shows children from poorer homes hear 15m […]
“How to Write Consistently Boring Scientific Literature”
Biologist Kaj Sand-Jensen, of the University of Copenhagen, offers advice to other scientists. He wrote a report: “How to Write Consistently Boring Scientific Literature,” Kaj Sand-Jensen, Oikos, vol. 116, no. 5, May 2007, pp. 723?7. It says: “Because science ought to be fun and attractive, particularly when many months of hard work with grant applications, […]