Ig Noble Awards (science)

[painted wolf]

ahh.. the Ig Nobles are out...

awards given to science that 'should not be reproduced in any way'.. this spoof award is given to the most unusual accomplishments of the year.

Ig Nobel winners

Medicine - Gregg Miller from the US for his invention of Neuticles - rubber replacement testicles for neutered dogs that are available in varying sizes and degrees of firmness. "Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honour," said Mr Miller.

Peace - A UK team for their pioneering research into the activity of locusts' brain cells while the insects watched clips from the Star Wars films.

Physics - John Maidstone from Australia for his part in an experiment that began in 1927 in which a glob of black tar drips through a funnel every nine years. Mr Maidstone shared the prize with a late colleague who died sometime after the second drop.

Biology - The University of Adelaide for "painstakingly smelling and cataloguing the peculiar odours produced by 131 different species of frogs when the frogs were feeling stressed".

Chemistry - A University of Minnesota team who set out to prove whether people can swim faster in water or sugar syrup.

Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off.

Nutrition - A Japanese researcher who photographed and analysed every meal he had consumed during a period of 34 years.

Literature - The many Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled".

Agricultural History - A study entitled The Significance of Mr Richard Buckley's Exploding Trousers: Reflections on an Aspect of Technological Change in New Zealand Dairy-Farming between the World Wars.

Fluid Dynamics - Pressures Produced When Penguins Pooh - Calculations on Avian Defaecation.

from the BBC : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4318888.stm


the Ig noble site: http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-top.html





wa:do

[Jaymes]

"Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off. "

I'd buy that, if only to torture people with.

[michel]

Originally Posted by Jensa

"Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off. "

I'd buy that, if only to torture people with.

A bit off topic (and I will bash tuna fish on my head as pennance) , I worked in a bank, as i have mentioned before.

We had an enormous walk in safe, where, apart from cash and ledgers, we kept tin boxes for customers (which presumably contained valuables-a bit like the modern safety deposit boxes). We had had a new alarm installed in the branch - and new alarm systems were renowned for being hard to 'fine tune' - most of the time, they would be set off by a large lorry thundering down the road in the middle of the night.

As a keyholder, I was called out by the local police, whenever the alarm went off (as was the other safe key holder); we had to wait for the police to check the branch for robbers, unlock the safe, check no one had got into it, lock up, and go home. Of course we were paid for this (being dragged out of bed at two o'clock in the morning, for an hour or so).

After awhile, I could see the alarm engineer was beginning to lose his grip "I juat cannot understand this!!!!" he would rant and rave as he tweaked the settings..........

I was talking to the other keyholder, telling him about the engineer's reaction, (This keyholder was a young single chap, who lived in a flat on his own), when he burst out laughing...........

After he had regained control, I asked him what was so funny. He told me.

He had been through a particularly nasty patch with money (He hadn't got any), when the new alarm was installed. Having heard that they were difficult to set, and having been called out, he put an alarm clock in a lockable black tin deed box, and put it amongst the others, in the safe. The alarm was set for 1.30 a.m; this was a clockwork alarm (so that once the alarm went off, it would continue to do so untill the spring wound down a bit, when it would go silent again).

He got away with this trick for nigh on two weeks; by which time he had earned himself enough money to get hmself straight.

He was never found out. Of course, I said nothing.........

[Jaiket]

Originally Posted by Jensa

"Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off. "

I'd buy that, if only to torture people with.

I'd buy it to torture myself awake in the morning.

Practical and funny.

[michel]

Alarm clock ?................oh, yes, I remember; what I used to wake up before pain wakes me up each morning....and it keeps good time as well.