Further insight, in this study, on what cats have in sight: “Cats and Illusory Motion,” Rasmus Bååth [pictured here], Takeharu Seno, Akiyoshi Kitaoka, Psychology, vol. 5, 2014, pp. 1131-1134. The authors, at Lund University, Sweden, Kyushu University, Japan, and Ritsumeikan University, Japan, report: “Many cat owners have probably looked into their cat’s eyes and wondered how the […]
Year: 2014
Ig Nobel winner Audoly on the physics of the lasso
Basile Audoly — who shared the 2006 Ig Nobel prize for physics with Sebastien Neukirch for insights into why, when you bend dry spaghetti, it often breaks into more than two pieces — has a new study about the physics of rodeo lassoing. The new paper is: “An introduction to the mechanics of the lasso,” Pierre-Thomas Brun, Neil […]
Grunts in Conversations
Conversational Grunts cause serious problems for automatic voice-transcribing algorithms. In fact, as late as year 2000, experts were writing : “… no satisfactory scheme for transcribing these items exists.” The quote is from Nigel Ward, who is currently professor of computer science at The university of Texas at El Paso. The professor has been analysing, […]
A neutral observer reports on her first Ig Nobel ceremony
What’s it feel like to attend your first Ig Nobel Prize ceremony? You’ll not find a better account than this: Cristine Russell wrote about her night at the Igs, for Scientific American. Russell begins: Ig Nobel Prizes Make You Laugh, Then Think By Cristine Russell | September 23, 2014 CAMBRIDGE, Mass.—What happens in the brains of people who […]