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The mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")

Issue number 2007-08

August 2007

ISSN 1076-500X

Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the

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A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in

Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)

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2007-08-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS

2007-08-02 Imminent Events

2007-08-03 What's New in the Magazine

2007-08-04 Cold Feet

2007-08-05 Ig Tickets & Delegations

2007-08-06 Star Trek: Ultimate Purpose

2007-08-07 Self-Compatible Daffodil Poets

2007-08-08 Android Hermetic Melancholia Competition

2007-08-09 Newest Noted Researchers

2007-08-10 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Aye, Smell! A Rat

2007-08-11 BLOGLIGHTS: Lifshitz-Slyozov-Wagner

2007-08-12 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Cylinder, Balm, Balm, Balm

2007-08-13 Improbable Research Events

2007-08-14 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)

2007-08-15 Our Address (*)

2007-08-16 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)

2007-08-17 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

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2007-08-02 Imminent Events

AUSTRALIA TOUR:

The Improbable Australia tour, Aug 20-29, will include

events in Hobart, Launceston, Smithton and Sydney.

Details (or, for the events in Sydney, might be) at

<http://tinyurl.com/k87xs>

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2007-08-03 What's New in the Magazine

The July/August issue (vol. 13, no. 4) of the Annals of

Improbable Research is the special What's in Your Head issue.

Highlights include:

<> "Where in Your Head?," by Alice Shirrell Kaswell.

<> "Phrenology Favorites," by Stephen Drew.

<> "The Neural Correlate of Ignorance," by Kai M. Schreiber.

The table of contents is at <http://tinyurl.com/2jfbad>

To subscribe (6 paper issues per year) go to

<http://improbable.com/subscribe>

or see info at bottom of this newsletter.

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2007-08-04 Cold Feet

We have amassed a small collection of provocative research about

cold feet. Here are highlights, without comment or edification.

COLD FEET: DUCKS

"Heat Loss from Ducks' Feet Immersed in Cold Water," Delbert L.

Kilgore, Jr., and Knut Schmidt-Nielsen, The Condor, vol. 77, no.

4, Winter 1975, pp. 475-8.

COLD FEET: BASKETBALLERS

"Surface Temperature, Body Temperature, and Heart Rate as

Affected by Immersing the Feet of Conditioned Basketball Players

in Cold Water Bath," F. L. Jacobsen, Thesis (M.S.), South Dakota

State University, 1968.

COLD FEET: OYSTERS

"Do Oysters Get Cold Feet in Sweden? A Preliminary Report on

Winter Tolerance of Ostrea Edulis Linné, from the Swedish West

Coast," E.M. Rödström, in N. De Pauw, et al., editors,

Aquaculture: A Biotechnology in Progress, 1989, pp. 361.

COLD FEET: ADVENTURES IN DENTISTRY

"The Journey Back, Part Three. Cold Feet and Warm Sand vs. the

Next Big Step," P. Kohlsaat, Northwest Dentistry, vol. 80, part

2, 2001, pp. 21-8.

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2007-08-05 Ig Tickets & Delegations

TICKETS for the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony are now on sale:, from

the Harvard Box Office <http://www.boxoffice.harvard.edu/>

DELEGATIONS: If you'd like to bring an official audience

delegation (five or more people), first get tickets, then please

<http://tinyurl.com/2cvjnf>.

The ceremony will be on Thursday night, October 4. This year's

theme: CHICKEN. Details, and a downloadable poster, are at

<http://tinyurl.com/2cvjnf>.

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2007-08-06 Star Trek: Ultimate Purpose

Star Trek has fulfilled its ultimate purpose -- a tool to teach

people about Direct Marketing.

So one infers from reading a dispatch by Matt Bailey. Bailey

describes himself as "a speaker and trainer for the Direct

Marketing Association, the American Advertising Federation, and

the Search Engine Strategies Conferences." He writes (at

<http://tinyurl.com/2flwq6>):

***

The fun is in finding effective and memorable methods to help

people understand the concepts. One of my favorites is an

analysis of the Red-Shirt Phenomenon in Star Trek. What? You

don't know about the Red Shirt Phenomenon? Well, as any die-hard

Trekkie knows, if you are wearing a red shirt and beam to the

planet with Captain Kirk, you're gonna die. That's the common

thinking, but I decided to put this to the test. ... Unless we

dug into Kirk's personal life, we may never have spotted the

contrast of Kirk's attraction to alien females as it related to

saving red-shirt crewmen's lives.

***

(Thanks to investigator Ron Josephson for bringing this to our

attention.)

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2007-08-07 Self-Compatible Daffodil Poets

The judges have chosen a winner for last month's Self-Compatible

Daffodil Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to

honor the following study:

The winner is INVESTIGATOR HERKY GOTTFRIED, who wrote:

When boy parts and girl parts of plants

Grow closely together by chance,

"They'll all be inbred,"

It is usually said,

But this shows it's just happenstance.

A runner-up mention goes to INVESTIGATOR TONY HARKER:

Spare a thought for the humble narcissus

That knows to inbreed's inauspicious.

By keeping apart

The bits at its heart

It won't be both Mr. and Mrs.

And here is the latest from Limerick Laureate MARTIN EIGER:

When daffodils contemplate mates,

They ignore certain physical traits.

The plants seek a means

For spreading their genes --

Just like people when going on dates.

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2007-08-08 Android Hermetic Melancholia Competition

Hermetic melancholia is the subject of this month's limerick

competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that

illuminates the nature of this report:

"Hermetic Melancholia and the Suffering of Androids,"

Eric G. Wilson, Esoterica, vol. 8, 2006, pp. 83-111.

The author explains:

"Ever since Victoria Nelson published her book on the

spiritual scope of puppets, many of us have been

re-thinking our relationship to creatures generally

ignored or even excoriated by esoteric thinkers."

The article is online at

<http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeVIII/EsotericaVIII.pdf>

RULES: Please make sure your rhymes actually do, and that your

poem is in classic, trips-off-the-tongue limerick form.

PRIZE: The winning poet will receive a (if we manage to send it

to the correct address) a free, possibly melancholic issue of the

Annals of Improbable Research. Send entries (one entry per

entrant) to:

ANDROID HERMETIC MELANCHOLIA COMPETITION

c/o <marca AT chem2.harvard.edu>

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2007-08-09 Newest Noted Researchers

New members of The Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists

(LFHCfS):

Eric Bakovi_

David Serre (returning after mysterious absence)

Michael Hellwig

Jennifer Aitken

See them and the other members at:

<http://improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/>

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2007-08-10 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Aye, Smell! A Rat

Each month we select for your special attention a research report

that seems particularly worth a close read. This month's pick:

"Rats Assess Degree of Relatedness from Human Odors," E. M.

Ables, L. M. Kay, and J. M. Mateo, Physiology and Behavior, vol.

90, no. 5, April 23, 2007, pp. 726-32. (Thanks to Wim Crusio for

bringing this to our attention.) The authors explain:

"Rats were first habituated to a referent human odor and were

then presented with two test odors obtained from individuals

related in different degrees to the referent. Investigation times

for each odor were compared.... For six of ten odor donor

families, rats investigated the odor of the less closely related

individual significantly longer than that of the more closely

related individual, and investigation durations were in the

expected direction for all families."

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2007-08-11 BLOGLIGHTS: Lifshitz-Slyozov-Wagner

Here are some recent topics in our blog:

<> The Lifshitz-Slyozov-Wagner theory of coarsening

<> Kids' food face indications

<> Lean images

<> Horror online

<> MATH LESSON: Assumptive steps

and some from the newspaper column in The Guardian:

<> Right there in your head, so they say

<> Sounding gay

... and others

Read the blog

every day at <http://www.improbable.com>

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2007-08-12 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Cylinder, Balm, Balm, Balm

A NEW SPECIES IN STORE

"New Species of Cylinder," P. Semple, Anaesthesia, vol. 62, no.

4, 2007, p. 428. (Thanks to Adrian Smith for bringing this to our

attention.)

EARLY PROFIT INITIATIVE

"Implementing Pay-For-Performance in the Neonatal Intensive

Care," Jochen Profit, et al, Pediatrics, vol. 119, no. 5, 2007,

pp. 975-82. (Thanks to Keith Nockels for bringing this to our

attention.)

A CORNUCOPIA OF BALM

"The Safety and Efficacy of a Mixture of Honey, Olive Oil, and

Beeswax for the Management of Hemorrhoids and Anal Fissure: A

Pilot Study," Noori S. Al-Waili, Khelod S. Saloom, Thia N. Al-

Waili, and Ali N. Al-Waili, Scientific World Journal, vol. 6,

2006, pp. 1998-2005. (Thanks to Dany Adams for bringing this to

our attention.)

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2007-08-13 Improbable Research Events

For details and additional events, see

<http://improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule>

IMPROBABLE AUSTRALIA TOUR -- AUG 20-29, 2007

IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY -- OCT 4, 2007

IG INFORMAL LECTURES -- OCT 6, 2007

FESTIVAL DELLA SCIENZA, GENOA, ITALY -- OCT 2007

NOKIA SIEMENS NETWORKS - GET INSIDE EVENT

LONDON, UK -- NOV 23, 2007

IMPERIAL COLLEGE, LONDON -- NOV 26, 2007

AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, BOSTON -- FEB, 2008

IG NOBEL UK TOUR -- MAR, 2008

DFG ANNUAL ASSEMBLY, BERLIN, GERMANY -- JUL 1, 2008

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2007-08-14 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)

The Annals of Improbable Research is a paper magazine. (It's not

just the little bits of overflow material you've been reading in

this newsletter). Subscribe at <http://improbable.com/subscribe/>

or send in this form:

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2007-08-15 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: <http://www.improbable.com>

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2007-08-16 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

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

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2007-08-17 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)

What you are reading right now is mini-AIR. Mini-AIR is a (free!)

tiny monthly *supplement* to the bi-monthly print magazine.

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