Here’s a new review of a new history of fish and chips in Britain: “Book Review: Fish and Chips: A History,” Spencer Swain, Cultural Sociology, vol. 9 no. 4, December 2015, pp. 590-592. (Thanks to Dan Vergano for bringing this to our attention.) The author, at Leeds Beckett University, UK, reviews the book Fish and […]
Tag: Fish
Dropped red herring attacks
The ‘Dropped Red Herring Attack’ was first (Improbable believes) described by Professor Brad Karp (pictured right) and colleagues Dr. James Newsome and Professor Dawn Song in their paper for Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium On Recent Advances In Intrusion Detection (RAID 2006), entitled: ‘Paragraph: Thwarting signature learning by training maliciously’. “In the Dropped Red […]
Frozen chicken, wild fish, and fingernails
Frozen chicken, wild fish, and fingernails all come together in a single, scientific investigation: “Frozen chicken for wild fish: Nutritional transition in the Brazilian Amazon region determined by carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios in fingernails,” Gabriela B. Nardoto, et al., American Journal of Human Biology, Epub May 31, 2011. The authors explain: “Amazonian populations […]
Collision Detection: Bees versus Fish (by Ig Nobel Prize winners)
Ig Nobel Prize winners Marie Dacke and Emily Baird are now exploring how how bees collide or don’t is different from how fish collide or don’t. They and their colleagues have just published a study of the matter. The 2013 Ig Nobel Prize jointly in the fields of biology and astronomy was awarded to Marie Dacke, Emily […]
Improbable visit to No Such Thing as a Fish
The QI elves (the researchers who gather and lovingly prepare the guts of the QI television program) kindly invited me to join in on their podcast, which is called “No Such Thing as a Fish”. The official description: Episode 6: This week in the QI Office Andrew Hunter Murray (@andrewhunterm), James Harkin (@eggshaped), Anna Ptaszynski […]
The Candy-Fish Sustainability Experiment
Candy fish gain an additional and/or alternative kind of value in this study: “Ecological and evolutionary effects of harvesting: lessons from the candy-fish experiment.” Beatriz Diaz Pauli [pictured here] and Mikko Heino, ICES Journal of Marine Science, vol. 70, no. 7, 2013, pp. 1281-1286. (Thanks to investigator Martin Aker for bringing this to our attention.) The […]
It’s a land fish, they say
The self-proclaimed first highlight of a new study is this: The Pacific leaping blenny, Alticus arnoldorum, is a land fish. The study is: “Natural selection in novel environments: predation selects for background matching in the body colour of a land fish,” Courtney L. Morgans and Terry J. Ord, Animal Behaviour, epub October 23, 2013. Here, in chart […]
Chin Chin Fish Foot Massage Mystery
“A fish pedicure is the process in which the user places their feet in a tank of water (which may be for individual use or shared) to mid-calf level and Garra rufa fish preferentially ‘nibble’ the thickened skin from the feet, usually for between 15 to 30 minutes.” The definition (and the photo) comes from […]
If you like to drop things, measuredly
If you like to drop things because you want to measure what happens to them, consider using the drop tower at the University of Bremen, Germany. Pertinent info abounds. Read Geoff Manaugh’s essay in Gizmodo (“This Tower Exists Solely for Dropping Things“). Read the tower authority’s attractive brochure, if you like — read that in German (“Experimente unter Schwerelosigkeit”) […]
Crap typo (fish)
Our Typo Evaluation Committee informs us that this is likely to be a typo: On the effect of agricultural chemicals upon fish – I. Changes of chemical components in serum and liver of crap exposed to organophosphate compounds. Sakaguchi, H Bull. Jap. Soc. Sci. Fish. Vol. 38, no. 6, pp. 555-560. 1972.