After 35 years in the USA, the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony is moving to Europe. This coming September 3, the 36th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony will take place in Zurich, Switzerland. TICKETS TICKETS TICKETS will go on sale Tuesday, May 12, 2026, at 10 am (CET), here at http://www.improbable.com [NOTE: We will also […]
A big thank you to everyone and everything who (or that) came to, helped organize, or otherwise was part of the 2019 Ig Nobel EuroTour. It all happened in six weeks, in ten countries: Scotland, England, Austria, The Czech Republic, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Poland, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Germany, and Italy (again). Several of the events were webcast, including […]
European goo gets a good going over, intellectually, in this marginal paper: “Black Goo: Forceful Encounters with Matter in Europe’s Muddy Margins,” Stuart McLean [pictured here], Cultural Anthropology, vol. 26, no. 4, 2011, pp. 589–619. The author, at the University of Minnesota, explains; “This essay undertakes an evocative conjuration of alternative visions of materialism through consideration […]
If you have wondered whether there is a molecular basis for the blond hair evident on many northern Europeans, some degree of enlightenment is available. See the study “A molecular basis for classic blond hair color in Europeans“, published in 2014 in the journal Nature Genetics. The F1000 Prime blog discusses that study in brief.