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.
Portfolio of a Genius
The new version of Portfolio of a Genius has just arrived. For the better part of a decade, we have been receiving the laboriously crafted, increasingly thick versions of this wondrous work. They arrive in our mailbox at the post office, always unanticipated, always surprising by their very existence. The author, James E. Shepherd, Jr. […]
Garlic on the Family
‘This study assessed the effects of the odour and ingestion of garlic bread on family interactions.” With those opening words, Alan R Hirsch of the Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation, in Chicago, Illinois, declared the purpose and the breadth of his research. So begins this week’s Improbable Research column in The Guardian. Read […]
Mad Cow / Opera
Is mad cow disease a tragedy of operatic scale? Not yet, but it is of mini-operatic scale. “The Brain Food Opera,”a mini-opera in 3 acts, was performed at the 2000 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony. The entire libretto is here, and you can hear the perfomance by listening to NPR Science Friday’s broadcast of the ceremony, […]