mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
November 2020, issue number 2020-11. ISSN 1076-500X.
<https://www.improbable.com/airchives/miniair/>
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Research that makes people LAUGH, then THINK.
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01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Liars & Con Men, with Ig Imminent
03 Sniffing Out Pee Values
04 IG NOBEL STUFF: SciFri, Informal Lectures, Animation
05 Limerick Challenge: Sniffing in Conversation
06 Blue Balls Winner
07 MORE IMPROBABLE: Coffee for Covid?
08 Shape Sniffing
20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS
30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)
31 — How to start or stop receiving this little newsletter (*)
32 — Contact Info (*)
33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
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02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Liars & Con Men, with Ig Imminent
WHAT YOU ARE READING AT THIS MOMENT
is just our monthly newsletter, (mini-AIR).
This is overflow detritus from the actual magazine:
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR).
The special LIARS & CON MEN issue of the magazine is on the loose:
<https://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume26/v26i5/v26i5.php >
The next issue (vol 26, no. 6) will be a special IG NOBEL issue. That issue is in prep.
Tables of Contents: <http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>
SUBSCRIBE to the MAGAZINE,
or get BACK ISSUES (there are more than 150 of them!):
<https://gumroad.com/improbable>
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03 Sniffing Out Pee Values
This month's maybe-random research item:
"Sniffing Out Significant 'Pee Values': Genome Wide Association Study of Asparagus Anosmia," Sarah C. Markt, Elizabeth Nuttall, Constance Turman, Jennifer Sinnott, Eric B. Rimm, Ethan Ecsedy, Robert H. Unger, et al., BMJ, vol. 355, 2016, i6071. (Thanks to Rich Roberts for bringing this to our attention.)
<https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.i6071>
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04 IG NOBEL STUFF: SciFri, Informal Lectures, Animation
We want catch you up on what's happening in Ig world.
SCIENCE FRIDAY
The Science Friday (with Ira Flatow) program on public radio will broadcast this year's day-after-Thanksgiving Ig Nobel special on Friday, November 27, 2020.
In most cities (and online) it will be in hour 2 of the two-hour SciFri broadcast, but in some cities it will be in hour 1. In other cities, where there is no public radio station, it will be but a dream.
<https://www.sciencefriday.com/>
IG INFORMAL LECTURES
The lectures this year are all being recorded by the winners, rather than presented in a big room with an audience. We will release those, one at a time, online over the course of this month (Nov) and next (Dec). Keep your eyes peeled on the web site <https://www.improbable.com/category/ig-nobel/>
NY TIMES FOR KIDS CHINESE ANIMATION
You may not have seen the eight-minute-long animated tribute to this year's Ig made by the Chinese office of the NY Times for Kids. (It's got captioning in English.) Take a look:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuUq2uC99YM>
PRESS CLIPS
It can be fun to dip into some of the press accounts of the ceremony and winners. A fair number of them are collected here:
<https://www.improbable.com/press-clips/>
THE CEREMONY ITSELF
And the ceremony web page, with video of the ceremony, is at
<https://www.improbable.com/ig-about/the-30th-first-annual-ig-nobel-prize-ceremony/>
FURTHER GOOD STUFF FROM PAST WINNERS
The Japanese NHK TV network produced another (we think it's their third) hour-long program about some of the Japanese Ig winners and their dreams and plans. Even if you don't speak Japanese, it's pretty entertaining:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e969C_Zvl34>
Also, always, we put keep putting news of past winners' new adventures into the Improbable Research blog:
<https://www.improbable.com/category/ig-nobel/>
NEXT YEAR
No telling yet what form next year's ceremony (the 31st First Annual) will have. We'll keep an eye on how things are progressing with the pandemic.
For a full report about the 30th First Annual, see the forthcoming November/December issue (vol. 26, no. 6)—this year's special IG NOBEL issue — of the magazine (the Annals of Improbable Research.
<https://www.improbable.com/publications/magazine/>
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05 Limerick Challenge: Sniffing in Conversation
This month's RESEARCH LIMERICK challenge — Devise a pleasing limerick that encapsulates this study:
"Waiting to Inhale: On Sniffing in Conversation," Elliott M. Hoey, Research on Language and Social Interaction, vol. 53, no. 1, 2020, pp. 118-139, (Thanks to Tony Tweedale for bringing this to our attention.)
<https://tinyurl.com/y5ogb42q> The authors explain:
"Sniffing—the swift, audible, intake of breath through the nasal passage—is analyzed by reference to its sequential placement in talk. Using a collection of 70 cases of sniffs in naturally occurring conversations, two recurrent uses of sniffing are described."
Submit your perfectly formed, delightfully enlightening limerick to:
SNIFFING LIMERICK COMPETITION
c/o <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>
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06 Blue Balls Winner
The judges have chosen a winner in last month's Competition, which asked for a limerick to explain this patent:
"Blue Balls," Jonathan M. Chalett and Lewis T. Nerenberg, Pediatrics, vol. 108, no. 5, November 2001, p. 1233-4. <https://tinyurl.com/y6lkhqsz>
INVESTIGATOR ALLISON BROWN writes:
We knew that the stories were true:
Real perils to pitching hot woo!
A pair starts fore-play
The deed goes a-stray
And the balls of the boy DO turn "blue".
This month's take from our LIMERICK LAUREATE, MARTIN EIGER:
Is frustration inducing in you
An abnormal testicular hue?
Researchers reveal
It's not turquoise or teal,
But a soon to be curable blue.
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07 MORE IMPROBABLE: Coffee for Covid?
Recent improbable research bits you may have missed...
BLOG: <http://www.improbable.com/>:
* Coffee as a medical treatment for Covid-19
* Recent progress in Pokémon GO studies
* Most important psychology article published this year?
*…and much more
LUXURIANT FLOWING HAIR CLUB FOR SCIENTISTS (LFHCfS)
<https://www.improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/>
PODCAST:
<https://www.improbable.com/category/the-weekly-improbable-research-podcast/>:
Episode #1040: Automatically Recognize Boredom
Episode #1041: Drunk German Speech
Episode #1042: Hot Rod Magazines – A Harmless Diversion?”
Episode #1043: Leaping Fish Injuries
FACEBOOK: <http://www.facebook.com/improbableresearch>
TWITTER: @ImprobResearch, @MarcAbrahams, #IgNobel
INSTAGRAM: <https://www.instagram.com/improbable_research/>
PATREON: <www.patreon.com/ImprobableResearch>
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08 Shape Sniffing
"A Sniffer-Camera for Imaging of Ethanol Vaporization from Wine: The Effect of Wine Glass Shape," Takahiro Arakawa, Kenta Iitani, Xin Wang, Takumi Kajiro, Koji Toma, Kazuyoshi Yanoc and Kohji Mitsubayashi, Analyst, vol. 140, 2015, pp. 2881-2886. (Thanks to Adrian Smith for bringing this to our attention.)
<https://tinyurl.com/y5ogb42q>
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FIND (MUCH) MORE IMPROBABLE STUFF.
SUBCRIBE TO THE ACTUAL (PDF) MAGAZINE!
<www.improbable.com/magazine/>
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20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS
Harvard Club of Cape Cod (online) —Nov 19, 2020
"Science Friday" Ig Nobel broadcast —Nov 27, 2020
Ig Informal Lectures (online) —Nov & Dec (see web site)
Harvard Club of Merrimack Valley (online) —Dec 3, 2020
Café Scientifique, Muret, France (online) —Dec 9, 2020
Intersci, Edinburgh, Scotland (online) —Jan 11, 2021
Arisia. Boston (online) —Jan 2021 (date TBA)
Israel Physics Society (online) —Jan 22, 2021
2021 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony —September 2021
2021 Ig Nobel EuroTour (we hope) —TBA 2021
Ig Nobel Exhibition, Japan (we hope) —TBA 2021
For details and additional events, see
<http://www.improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule/>
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30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)
The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine,
in PDF form.
It's packed with research that makes people laugh, then think.
<www.improbable.com/magazine/>
SUBSCRIPTIONS ($25, for six issues)
BACK ISSUES ($5 each)
(mini-AIR, the thing you are reading at this moment, is but a tiny, free-floating appendix to the actual magazine.)
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31 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)
This newsletter, Mini-AIR, is just a (free!) tiny monthly *supplement* to the big, bold six-times-a-year magazine Annals of Improbable Research.
To SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE to mini-AIR:
<http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/mini-air>
ARCHIVES: <http://improbable.com/airchives/miniair>
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32 — CONTACT INFO (*)
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
EDITORIAL: <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>
SUBSCRIPTION QUESTIONS: <subscriptions AT improbable.com>
Cambridge, MA, USA
Twitter: @ImprobResearch
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33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)
EDITOR: Marc Abrahams
CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Nan Swift, 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 2020, Annals of Improbable Research
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