mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
October 2014, issue number 2014-10. ISSN 1076-500X.
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The monthly wee little tiny mini update/alert from Improbable Research
Archive at <http://improbable.com/airchives/miniair>
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2014-10-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
2014-10-02 Imminent Events
2014-10-03 In the Magazine: Chew Now, Feathers Soon
2014-10-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Monsters at the Royal Society
2014-10-05 Second-hand Bits From the Ig
2014-10-06 Dam, Bloodsucking Blackflies Limerick Competition
2014-10-07 No Jackson On Tenaculum Retraction Poet
2014-10-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Tiddlywinks, Voiding, Chevalier Jackson
2014-10-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Vampires and Rabies
2014-10-10 Improbable Research Events
2014-10-11 — How to Get the Magazine (*)
2014-10-12 — Our Address (*)
2014-10-13 — Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2014-10-14 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
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2014-10-02 Imminent Events
Santiago, Chile — Oct 20-22
Live Arts, Northampton, MA, USA — Oct 24
Harvard U, Cambridge, MA, USA — Oct 28
MIT Press Bookstore, Cambridge, MA — Nov 19
Harvard Odontological Society, Boston, MA — Nov 20
Science Friday Ig Nobel radio broadcast — Nov 28
Full events schedule at <http://goo.gl/tzwJt>
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2014-10-03 In the Magazine: Chew Now, Feathers Soon
The next issue of the magazine — the special FEATHERS issue, is enjoying its brief visit to the printer, prior to its being mailed to subcribers.
You can see bits of the current issue — the special CHEWING issue — at <http://goo.gl/KlG0hH>:
Download a FREE E-BOOK ISSUE <http://goo.gl/BMzMw>
Links to all issues: <http://www.improbable.com/magazine>
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2014-10-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Monsters at the Royal Society
This month the focus arrives at the Royal Society, as it contemplated monsters:
"The Understanding of Monsters at the Royal Society in the First Half of the Eighteenth Century," P.F. da Costa, Endeavour, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 34-9. <http://goo.gl/cirytI> The author, at the University of Cambridge, UK, reports:
"This article first focuses on the general interest in monsters within the context of the natural historical agenda and corporate activity of the Society and then addresses the medical understanding of monsters by members of the Society. Finally, it discusses some of the moral and social implications of their medicalization in eighteenth century England.
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2014-10-05 Second-hand Bits From the Ig
If you missed the 24th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, you can still glean bits of it, second or third hand, by browsing through some of the more entertaining press accounts:
If that somehow leaves you wanting more, wander through this lengthier (but very partial) wonderland: <http://www.improbable.com/press-clips/>
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2014-10-06 Dam, Bloodsucking Blackflies Limerick Competition
Bloodsucking blackflies, and a dam, inspire this month's limerick competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that clarifies the nature of this invention:
"Mass Occurrence of Bloodsucking Blackflies in a Regulated River Reach: Localization Of Oviposition Habitat of Simulium Truncatum Using DNA Barcoding," . Brabrand, T. Bremnes, A. G. Koestler, G. Marthinsen, H. Pavels, E. Rindal, J. E. Raastad, S. J. Saltveit, and A. Johnsen, River Research and Applications, vol. 30, no. 5, June 2014, pp. 602–608. <http://goo.gl/tKXRMK> (Thanks to Tom Gill for bringing this to our attention.) The authors explain:
"The mass occurrence of S. truncatum is a phenomenon probably created by man, directly related to the river regulation regime and the construction of a dam in 1936, which gave rise to the formation of the channel and the erosion edge."
Submit your perfectly formed limerick to:
DAM, BLOODSUCKING BLACKFLIES LIMERICK COMPETITION
c/o <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>
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2014-10-07 No Jackson On Tenaculum Retraction Poet
The judges — embarrassed at having mixed up the names and poems of the winners and runners-up in last month's competition, and fearing that to try to correct those errors now, here, would lead to them committing even more grievous erros — have declared there to be no winner for last month's Jackson On Tenaculum Retraction Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to honor this study:
"Tenaculum Retraction in Laryngofissure," Chevalier Jackson, Journal of Laryngology & Otology 51, no. 08 (1936): 530-531. Jackson wrote: "...co-ordinated control of the thyroid wing during the use of the perichondrial elevator that is not unlike the co-ordinate use of knife and fork in eating."
Here, though, is the offering from our undauntable LIMERICK LAUREATE MARTIN EIGER:
The laryngofissure, I blew it.
The thyroid wing — couldn't get through it.
Had I tried the extraction
With Jackson's retraction,
I then would have known how to do it.
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2014-10-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Tiddlywinks, Voiding, Chevalier Jackson
Recent improbable bits you maybe missed:
IMPROBABLE BLOG:
"Rating tiddlywinks (statistically)" <http://goo.gl/xxyxR1>
"Does it matter for men (and pharma companies) whether they sit or stand?" <http://goo.gl/jDdK6i>
"The swallowed objects amassed by Chevalier Jackson" <http://goo.gl/Y605go>
...and MORE, MORe, MOre, More, more at <http://improbable.com>
NEWSPAPER COLUMN (in The Guardian):
<http://www.theguardian.com/education/series/improbableresearch>
IMPROBABLE INNOVATION BLOG (on BetaBoston.com):
<http://betaboston.com/improbable-innovation/>
twitter: @ImprobResearch, @MarcAbrahams, #IgNobel
facebook: <http://www.facebook.com/improbableresearch>
books: <http://goo.gl/rHMb3t>
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2014-10-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Vampires and Rabies
"Rabies: A Possible Explanation for the Vampire Legend," J. Gomez-Alonso, Neurology, vol. 51, no. 3, September 1998, pp. 856-9. <http://goo.gl/6gmN8Y> The author is at Hospital Xeral, Vigo (Galicia), Spain.
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2014-10-10 Improbable Research Events
For details and additional events, see
<http://improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule>
Santiago, Chile — Oct 20-22
Live Arts, Northampton, MA, USA — Oct 24
Harvard U, Cambridge, MA, USA — Oct 28
MIT Press Bookstore, Cambridge, MA — Nov 19
Harvard Odontological Society, Boston, MA — Nov 20
Science Friday Ig Nobel radio broadcast — Nov 28
ARISIA, Boston, MA, USA — Jan, 2015
AAAS Annual Meeting, San Jose, CA, USA — Feb, 2015
Ig Nobel Tour of Scandinavia — Mar, 2015
Ig Nobel Tour of the UK — Mar, 2015
Japan — Jun, 2015
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2014-10-11 — How to Get the Magazine (*)
The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine. (It's much bigger and better than the little bits in this newsletter.)
We produce each issue as an e-book, as well as on traditional paper.
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2014-10-12 — Our Address (*)
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA
(+1) 617-491-4437, FAX: (+1) 617-661-0927
EDITORIAL: <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>
PRINT SUBSCRIPTIONS: <subscriptions AT improbable.com>
Web Site and blog: <http://www.improbable.com>
Twitter: @ImprobResearch
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2014-10-13 — 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
CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, Stephen Drew
PROOFREADER: Ambient Happenstance
AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, Richard Roberts
Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the
(c) copyright 2014, Annals of Improbable Research
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2014-10-14 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)
Mini-AIR is a (free!) teeny-tiny monthly *supplement* to the actual six-times-a-year magazine AIR.
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