Category: Ig Nobel

Lal Bihari, the founder and head of the Association of Dead People — and winner of the 2003 Ig Nobel Peace Prize — is standing for elective office. See a video news report here. See a further news report about it here. And that’s not all. As head of the Association, Lal Bihari is encouraging […]

When Prof. Yukio Hirose of Kanazawa University expressed his warmest gratitude for pigeons and crows upon receiving the Ig Nobel Chemistry Prize (a parody of the Nobel Prize) in October, the audience at Harvard University exploded into cheers…. So begins a report about the 2003 Ig Nobel Chemistry Prize winner, who won his prize for […]

If you you can’t get enough Trinkaus — and be aware that that makes you part of a growing horde — a rich analytical look is now available. Investigator Don Danila has written “Trinkaus: Another Informal Look.” It was published in the Nov/Dec 2003 issue of the Annals of Improbable Research. Partly because of the […]

George Nichols, who helped give birth to Murphy’s Law, will make an exceedingly rare public appearance tomorrow night (Jan 27) at Caltech. He was head of the project at Edwards Air Force Base in California where, in 1949, he, Colonel John Paul Stapp, and Captain Edward A. Murphy, Jr. jointly, if disjointedly, gave rise to […]

“Ode on the Mammoth Cheese” gained new prominence when John W. Trinkaus accepted his Ig Nobel Literature Prize in 2003. Trinkaus was presented with a special framed copy of the famous 1884 cheese poem, a copy signed by four Nobel Laureates. Read about it in the Nov/Dec 2003 issue of the magazine, or read it […]

The most nanoscopically sweeping and comprensive — and according to some critics, the most impassioned — Nano-Lecture delivered at the 2003 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony was by Eric Lander, on the topic THE GENOME. See it here. This is the fifth of the five Nano-Lectures weve posted. All five of the Nano-Lectures can be heard […]

Perhaps the most definitionally piercing Nano-Lecture delivered at the 2003 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony was by Harvard College senior Genevieve Reynolds, on the topic EDUCATION. See it here. This is the fourth of the five Nano-Lectures we’ll be posting.

Kees Moeliker, who won the 2003 Ig Nobel Biology Prize for documenting the first scientifically recorded case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck, published a photo-rich diary of his Ig experience. See it here. Aline McKenzie of the Dallas Morning News personally tested Bow-Lingual, the automatic dog-to-human-language translation device, the inventors of which received […]

At the 2003 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, Nobel Laureate William Lipscomb delivered an especially animated Nano-Lecture, on the topic CHEMISTRY. See it here. This is the third of the five Nano-Lectures we’ll be posting. The Nano-Lecture recalled Mike Stanfill’s magnificent tribute to Tom Lehrer, which was part of the 2002 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony.

Some call him “Z.” Who is he,that handsome young man with the intent gaze, and why is he holding a rat, and what fortune became him many years later? The answer is here, the honor is described here.