Mini-AIR

mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")

April 2023, issue number 2023-04. ISSN 1076-500X.

https://improbable.com/publications/newsletter-mini-air/

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Research that makes people LAUGH, then THINK.

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01 TABLE OF CONTENTS

02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Water, Water, Water

03 Brayne's Account of Informed Brain Donation

04 Two (2!) Ig Nobel Prize Events — The Ceremony, and Face-to-Face

05 Limerick Challenge: Scull on Brains, in Brain

06 McNugget Monoid Winner

07 MORE IMPROBABLE: Moths, Failure, Cannibals

08 Head's Thoughts on Disordered Symbolic Thinking

20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS

30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)

31 — How to start or stop receiving this little newsletter (*)

32 — Contact Info (*)

33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)

Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.

What you are reading at the moment (mini-AIR) is overflow detritus from the magazine Annals of Improbable Research (AIR).

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02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Water, Water, Water

If you are, in part or in whole, water, we suggest you read the special WATER issue (vol. 29, no. 2) of the magazine. The table of contents and selected articles are at:

https://improbable.com/publications/magazine/annals-of-improbable-research-mar-apr-2023-vol-29-number-2/

The next issue — the special FORMULAS AND RECIPES issue — is in prep, and will appear soon for subscribers.

SUBSCRIBE to the MAGAZINE, or get BACK ISSUES (there are more than 150 of them!): https://gumroad.com/improbable

Tables of Contents: https://improbable.com/publications/magazine/

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03 Brayne's Account of Informed Brain Donation

This month's quasi-haphazardly selected research report of the month (QHSRROTM) is:

"A Scientifically Informed Brain Donation Programme: A DPUK Initiative To Offer Brain Donation To Participants In Longitudinal Cohorts." Helen Costello, Paul T. Francis, and Carol Brayne, Alzheimer's and Dementia, vol. 13, no. 7S, part 10, 2017, pp. P516-P517.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jalz.2017.06.595

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04 Two (2!) Ig Nobel Prize Events — The Ceremony, and Face-to-Face

Because of the pandemic-era complexities (nice broadly vague word, that, "complexities"!) the 33rd First Annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony will (as in the previous pandemic years) happen entirely as a webcast, not in a theatre.

But/and some happy news: This year we will do TWO Ig Nobel Prize events, the first in September, the second in October.

At the first event, a webcast, the ten new Ig Nobel Prize winners will be revealed, and will receive their Prizes.

At the second event, in Sanders Theater at Harvard University, the winners will ask each other questions about their work.

Here's a little more detail:

THE 33RD FIRST ANNUAL IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY —

The 33rd First Annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony will be webcast on Thursday, September 14, 2023, at 6:00 pm (US eastern time).

(This event will happen entirely as a webcast, not in a theater.)

IG NOBEL FACE-TO-FACE —

This year there will be a new, companion event called IG NOBEL FACE-TO-FACE. Ig Nobel Prize winners and other researchers will ask each other questions about their work. There will also be music and other good stuff. This new event will happen in Sanders Theatre, at Harvard University, on Saturday evening, October 14, 2023. TICKET INFO will be announced here and on the Improbable.com web site.

(This event will not be webcast live.)

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05 Limerick Challenge: Scull on Brains, in Brain

This month's RESEARCH LIMERICK challenge — Devise a pleasing limerick that encapsulates this study:

"Left Brain, Right Brain: One Brain, Two Brains," Andrew Scull, Brain, vol. 33, no. 10, 2010, pp. 3153-3156.

https://doi.org/10.1093/brain/awq255

Submit your perfectly formed, delightfully enlightening limerick to:

SCULL ON BRAINS LIMERICK COMPETITION

c/o MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM

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06 McNugget Monoid Winner

The judges have chosen a winner in last month's Competition, which asked for a limerick to explain this study:

"Distances Between Factorizations in the Chicken McNugget Monoid," Scott Chapman, Pedro Garcia-Sanchez, Christopher O'Neill, arXiv 1912.04494v1, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/07468342.2021.1909953

Winning limerickicist DAVID WEINBERGER writes:

These lads are such fans of McNugget

They want to both eat it and hug it.

"Let's see if McD

will give us some free

If we write up a paper to plug it."

This month's take from our LIMERICK LAUREATE, MARTIN EIGER:

For counting McNuggets, three guys

Show advanced mathematics applies.

This work paves the way

For their futures, one day,

Asking customers if they want fries.

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07 MORE IMPROBABLE: Moths, Failure, Cannibals

Recent improbable research bits you may have missed...

BLOG: https://www.improbable.com :

* Counting Moths

* On the Risk of Failing to Put Failure in Its Place

* Ambiguous-Title Warning: Not for Cannibals

*…and much more

WEEKLY COLUMN IN NEW SCIENTIST MAGAZINE:

https://www.newscientist.com/author/marc-abrahams/

LUXURIANT FLOWING HAIR CLUB FOR SCIENTISTS (LFHCfS):

https://www.improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/

PODCAST:

https://www.improbable.com/category/the-weekly-improbable-research-podcast/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/improbableresearch

MASTODON: @MarcAbrahams@mstdn.science

TWITTER: @ImprobResearch, @MarcAbrahams, #IgNobel

INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/improbable_research/

PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/ImprobableResearch

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08 Head's Thoughts on Disordered Symbolic Thinking

This month's Other Haphazardly-Selected Research Report (OQHSRROTM) of the month is:

"Disorders of Symbolic Thinking and Expression," Henry Head, British Journal of Psychology, vol. 11, no. 2, 1921, pp. 179-193.

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8295.1921.tb00016.x

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TREAT YOURSELF TO (MUCH) MORE IMPROBABLE STUFF.

SUBCRIBE TO THE (PDF) MAGAZINE!

https://improbable.com/publications/magazine/

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20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS

Bay Area Skeptics, California, USA — Jun 8, 2023

Quark Matter Conference, Houston, TX, USA — Sep 8, 2023

33rd First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony —Sep 14, 2023

Ig Nobel Face-to-Face, Cambridge, MA, USA — Oct 14, 2023

Ig Nobel EuroTour (Maybe) — date TBA

[All live events in 2023 are subject to pandemical constraints and adventures.]

For details and additional events, see

https://improbable.com/upcoming-events/

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30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)

The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine,

in PDF form. It's packed with research that makes people laugh, then think.

https://improbable.com/publications/magazine

SUBSCRIPTIONS ($25, for six issues)

BACK ISSUES ($5 each)

(mini-AIR, the thing you are reading at this moment, is but a tiny, free-floating appendix to the actual magazine.)

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31 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)

This newsletter, Mini-AIR, is just a (free!) tiny monthly *supplement* to the big, bold six-times-a-year magazine Annals of Improbable Research.

To SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE to mini-AIR, see the links at the end of this email.

ARCHIVES: https://improbable.com/publications/newsletter-mini-air/

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32 — CONTACT INFO (*)

Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)

https://improbable.com

EDITORIAL: MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM

SUBSCRIPTION QUESTIONS: subscriptions AT improbable.com

Cambridge, MA, USA

Twitter: @ImprobResearch

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33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)

EDITOR: Marc Abrahams

CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Nan Swift, Stephen Drew

PROOFREADER: Ambient Happenstance

AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, Richard Roberts

Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the

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