Sagging pants and the logic of abductive inference

Not all that many academic studies have examined the possibilities of abductive inference with regard to sagging pants [sagging trousers (UK)]. There are exceptions though. Professor Marcia Morgado of the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa has a paper in the journal Critical Studies in Men’s Fashion (Volume 2 Issue 2-3, September 2015) which: “[…] explores […]

Trouser (pants) creases – a metrological examination

If you’re one those people who wonders about accurate trouser-crease measurement in woolen trousers (pants), you should perhaps turn to the Textile Research Journal, March 1966 36: pp. 264-272, where R.C. Landwehr (of the Western Regional Research Lab, Albany, California) presented an apparatus and procedures to reliably measure wool creases. The ratio of maximum crease […]

Flammable trousers: then, and later, and now

Behold three eras in the international saga of trouser flammability. THEN: The 2005 Ig Nobel Prize for agricultural history was awarded to James Watson of Massey University, New Zealand, for his study, concerning the period between World War I and World War II, called “The Significance of Mr. Richard Buckley’s Exploding Trousers.” LATER: This month, in 2013, the […]

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