PLEASE FORWARD/POST AS APPROPRIATE ================================================================ The mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR") Issue number 2006-04 April 2006 ISSN 1076-500X Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the ---------------------------------------------------------------- A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in the bi-monthly paper magazine Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) ================================================================ ----------------------------- 2006-04-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2006-04-02 Imminent Events 2006-04-03 What's New in the Magazine 2006-04-04 Tippling and Taxes (1) 2006-04-05 Tippling and Taxes (2) 2006-04-06 His Pal the Polymath 2006-04-07 Professor-Professors (5th helping) 2006-04-08 Clean Safety Engineering Challenge: Soap 2006-04-09 Mastication-Perception Limerick Contest 2006-04-10 More Hair (LFHCfS) 2006-04-11 Incompetence on Demand 2006-04-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Hypothetical People Smell Good 2006-04-13 On Our Blog 2006-04-14 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Three cheesy studies 2006-04-15 Improbable Research Events 2006-04-16 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) 2006-04-17 Our Address (*) 2006-04-18 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) 2006-04-19 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue. mini-AIR is a free monthly *e-supplement* to the print magazine Annals of Improbable Research ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-02 Imminent Events APRIL: two Improbable Research talks -- one for the Mass. Medical Society, and one at MIT MAY: The Ig Nobel Tour of the Netherlands For details see section 2006-04-15 below ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-03 What's New in the Magazine The Mar/Apr issue (vol. 12, no. 2) of the Annals of Improbable Research is the annual special PAINTING issue (and also contains a special section about Grand Canyon research). Highlights include four articles that also appear online: <> "Canine Reactions to the Mona Lisa," by Catherine Maloney, Sarah J. Lichtblau, Nadya Karpook, Carolyn Chou, and Anthony Arena-DeRosa. The authors continue the line of research they began with "Feline Reactions to Bearded Men." <> "Is the Grand Canyon a Fake?" by Earle E. Spamer. <> "Improbable Research Review," compiled by Dirk Manley. <> "Improbable Medical Review," compiled by Bertha Vanatian. ... and much more. The table of contents -- with links to those four articles -- is online at: To subscribe (6 paper issues per year) see Section 2006-04-16, below. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-04 Tippling and Taxes (1) This month's unasked question concerns the following study: "Tobacco and Alcohol Tax Relationships with Suicide in Switzerland," A. Yamasaki, et al., Psychological Reports, vol. 97, no. 1, August 1997, pp. 213-6. The authors explain that: "[Policies] designed to reduce the tobacco and alcohol consumption may succeed in reducing suicides as well. To test this hypothesis, correlations for suicide rates with alcohol consumption, taxes on alcohol and tobacco in Switzerland were examined using sets of time-series data from Switzerland in 1965-1994. The tax on tobacco correlated significantly negatively with male standardized suicide rate. The tax on alcohol also correlated significantly with male standardized suicide rate in an autoregressive model. On the other hand, significant relationships with female suicide rate were not found. Policies designed to reduce tobacco consumption are consistent with a benefit of reducing suicides, particularly for men in this sample." The question, which will remain unasked, is this: Does this train of reasoning make (1) absolute sense or (2) absolute nonsense? ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-05 Tippling and Taxes (2) A more recent, perhaps related study is called "Violence-Related Injury and the Price of Beer in England and Wales." The study supplies (among other things) the logic for an intriguing alternative method by which the British chancellor of the exchequer might reduce the number of assaults: stop young people having jobs. For details see ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-06 His Pal the Polymath Investigator Robert Hanrahan writes: I may not be the first to report my friend Bedros, but I consider him the paradigm of self-described polymaths. How many have companies and websites proclaiming their status? He is: Dr. Bedros Afeyan President Polymath Research Inc. Pleasanton, California http://www.polymath-usa.com ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-07 Professor-Professors (5th helping) Here, joining Professor Abraham Abraham and Professor Warren Warren (and the others featured here in past months), is a fifth offering of professor-professors. It includes another Professor Abraham Abraham: ABRAHAM S. ABRAHAM Professor of Medicine Hebrew University Hadassah Medical School (Thanks to INVESTIGATOR JANET ELISE ROSENBAUM for bringing this professor-professor to our attention.) MICHAEL MICHAEL Consulting Medical Oncologist Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute Clinical School University of Melbourne (Thanks to INVESTIGATOR IAN DAVIS for bringing this professor- professor to our attention.) SI SI Associate Professor Aichi Prefectural University (Thanks to INVESTIGATOR FERDINAND PEPER for bringing this professor-professor to our attention.) A further selection selection will appear here next month. Previous prof-profs are collected at ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-08 Clean Safety Engineering Challenge: Soap This month's Clean Safety Engineering Challenge is posed by investigator Mark Dionne: Somewhere on the planet there's an engineer who figured out the maximum weight they can make a bar of soap, so that when you drop it, it will not quite break your toe (but it will hurt like hell). If you answer this challenge at all, please answer EITHER Part 1 OR Part 2. Do NOT answer BOTH Part 1 and Part 2. Part 1: Who is that engineer? Part 2: What -- CONCISELY and CLEARLY -- is the calculation and result? Please don't send your answer, if you have one, to: MAXIMUM INTACT SOAP CHALLENGE c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-09 Mastication-Perception Limerick Contest Mastication perception is the subject of this month's limerick competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that illuminates the nature of this report: "Mastication and Food Texture Perception: Variation With Age," Laurence Mioche, Journal of Texture Studies, vol. 35, no. 2, June 2004, pp. 145-58. The author explains: Aging in healthy dentate subjects induces moderate alterations in neuro-muscular activity which could be partly compensated by changes in chewing behaviour such as lengthening of the chewing sequence. RULES: Please make sure your rhymes actually do, and that your limerick adheres to classic limerick form. PRIZE: The winning poet will receive a fairly chewy issue of the Annals of Improbable Research. Send entries (one entry per entrant) to: MASTICATION-PERCEPTION CONTEST c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-10 More Hair (LFHCfS) As usual, there's more hair, attached to new members, in the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfS). See it and them at: ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-11 Incompetence on Demand Here yet again, because more and more political leaders demand it, is a link to Dunning and Kruger's 2000 Ig Nobel Prize-winning report: "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments" ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Hypothetical People Smell Good Each month we select for your special attention a research report that seems particularly worth a close read. This month's pick: "Odors and the Perception of Hygiene," K.L Kerr, S.J. Rosero, and R.L. Doty, Perceptual and Motor Skills, vol. 100, no. 1, February 2005, pp. 135-41. The authors, who are at the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, found that: "Numerous associations were found. For example, a hypothetical person whose clothes smell of pine was rated as relatively more successful, intelligent, sociable, sanitary, and attractive than one whose clothes smelled of lemon, onion, or smoke. Sex differences, as well as differences between people who reported smelling their own laundry, were also found." ---------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-13 On Our Blog Here are some recent topics in our blog: <> The Crackpot incident <> The possible effect of kitty cats on floral profusion <> Afraid to dye? <> Froschmausekrieg and Fischmenschkrieg <> An elephant eating, and eating an elephant and some from the newspaper column in The Guardian: <> Initially wrong? <> School pigeons <> Common cold jazz ... and many others Read the blog at ----------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-14 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Three cheesy studies THE CASE OF THE CHEESY TOOTHMARK "Comparison Microscope Identification of a Cheese Bitemark: A Case Report," H. Bernitz and B.A. Kloppers, Journal of Forensic Odonto- Stomatology, vol. 20, no. 1, June 2002, pp. 13-6. WHEN CHEESE MEETS HAND: THE UNDERLYING STORY "Method Development for Assessing the Complete Process of Crumbling Cheese Using Hand Evaluation," S. Sandra, M.A. Stanford, M.R. McDaniel and L. Meunier Goddik, Journal of Food Science, vol. 69, no. 4, 2004, pp. SNQ127-30. CREAMER ON CHEESE "Rheological Evaluation of Maturing Cheddar Cheese," L.K. Creamer and N.F. Olson, Journal of Food Science, vol. 47, no. 2, 1982, pp 631-6 and 646. ------------------------------------------------------------ 2006-04-15 Improbable Research Events For details and updates see HAL SEMINAR, MIT -- TUE, APR 25, 2006 MASS. MEDICAL SOCIETY, WORCESTER DISTRICT -- THU, APR 27, 2006 IG NOBEL TOUR OF THE NETHERLANDS PINC CONFERENCE, THE NETHERLANDS -- TUE, MAY 16, 2006 CELEBRATION - OPENING OF THE IMPROBABLE RESEARCH EUROPEAN OFFICE, NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM, ROTTERDAM -- FRI, MAY 19 BESSENSAP, ZEIST, THE NETHERLANDS -- TUE, MAY 23, 2006 IG NOBEL TOUR OF AUSTRALIA -- AUG, 2006 ALPBACH TECH FORUM, ALPBACH, AUSTRIA -- AUG, 2006 2006 IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY -- THU, OCT 5, 2006 Sanders Theatre, Harvard University Tickets go on sale in August IG INFORMAL LECTURES -- SAT, OCT 7, 2006 MIT UNIV. OF ILLINOIS, Beckman Institute -- WED, OCT. 25 ASSOC OF COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY BIOLOGICAL EDUCATORS (ACUBE) Millikin University, Decatur, Illinois -- THU, OCT 26, 2006 -------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-16 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) Here's how to subscribe to the magnificent bi-monthly print journal The Annals of Improbable Research (the real thing, not just the little bits of overflow material you've been reading in this newsletter). ................................................................ Name: Address: Address: City and State: Zip or postal code: Country Phone: FAX: E-mail: ......................................................... SUBSCRIPTIONS (6 issues per year): USA 1 yr/$33 2 yrs/$60 Canada/Mexico 1 yr/$39 US 2 yrs/$65 US Overseas 1 yr/$49 US 2 yrs/$90 US ......................................................... BACK ISSUES are available, too: First issue: $9 USA, $11 Canada/Mex, $17 overseas Add'l issues purchased at same time: $7 each ......................................................... Send payment (US bank check, or international money order, or Visa, Mastercard or Discover info) to: Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 ----------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-17 Our Address (*) Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 EDITORIAL: marca AT chem2.harvard.edu SUBSCRIPTIONS: air AT improbable.com WEB SITE: ----------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-18 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes. ------------- mini-AIRheads ------------- EDITOR: Marc Abrahams MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne PSYCHOLOGY EDITOR: Robin Abrahams CO-CONSPIRATORS: Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, S. Drew MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts (c) copyright 2006, Annals of Improbable Research ----------------------------------------------------- 2006-04-19 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) What you are reading right now is mini-AIR. 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