The Straight Poop: Sociology of Canadian Donut Shops, Ongoing

The sociology of Canadian donut shops plays out afresh, as described in a New York Post report headlined “Lady poops on restaurant floor, flings it at cashier.” That report includes action video. The 1999 Ig Nobel Prize for sociology was awarded to Steve Penfold, of York University in Toronto, for doing his PhD thesis on the sociology of Canadian donut […]

Dirty Hands Make Dirty Leaders? (study)

Florien Cramwinckel Msc (Utrecht University, The Netherlands) researches how people respond to the moral behavior of others. As part of this remit, an experiment was devised in which 78 participants demonstrated how dirtiness versus cleanliness might influence moral behavior in leader–subordinate relationships :- “They were asked touch, smell, and evaluate a dirty (fake poop) or […]

3 Unexpected By-Products of (both real and fake) Luwak Coffee

The cost and caché of “the world’s most expensive coffee” — kopi luwak — has created at least three related industries. BACKGROUND: Long-time readers might recall that Kopi Luwak is made from coffee beans that have been partially digested by the Asian Palm-Civet (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus); an animal that cherry picks only certain fruits (some say, […]

The experiment where they purposely made poop glow in the dark

Investigator Kirk Maxey introduced us to this research by saying: “For those with fetishes, we can add multi-colors….” He gives details, including the image reproduced here, on his blog, which begins thus: Lose Weight…and your poop will glow in the dark too! Sean Davies had a problem to solve: If you genetically modify enteric bacteria to make them more […]

Advances in toilet system testing: Wigglers & Pseudo Poop

Whither waste? Toilet testing, not everyone’s cup of tea, makes things flow better, for society’s sake. Metafilter features a little roundup of toilet testing info (thanks to investigator Scott Langill for bringing it to our attention): Pseudo Poop for Testing Toilets Testing toilet flush performance naturally requires the replication of real-world loads. Striving for accuracy, […]

Delving into fecal transplants

Pagan Kennedy writes, in The Atlantic, the kinds of interest sparked by fecal transplants: The Poop Outlaws: At-Home Fecal Transplants to Cure Disease …But such treatments still shimmer in the future. In the meantime, the best approximation we’ve got is, well, crap…. Lately, rumors about poop miracles have been proliferating on the Internet. In patient support […]