PLEASE FORWARD/POST AS APPROPRIATE ================================================================ The mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR") Issue Number 1997-03 March, 1997 ISSN 1076-500X Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the ---------------------------------------------------------------- A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in The Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), the journal of inflated research and personalities ================================================================ ----------------------------- 1997-03-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1997-03-01 Table of Contents 1997-03-02 mini-Houskeeping Notes 1997-03-03 What's New in AIR 1997-03-04 Face Value 1997-03-05 Fat Chance 1997-03-06 Scientist Stereotypes 1997-03-07 More Smartypants 1997-03-08 Interlingual Universal History (Czech) 1997-03-09 Cloning Update 1997-03-10 Call for Ig Nominations 1997-03-11 Scientific Correctness: Zippy Travel 1997-03-12 AIRhead Project 2000 1997-03-13 May We Recommend 1997-03-14 AIRhead Events 1997-03-15 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) 1997-03-16 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) 1997-03-17 Our Address (*) 1997-03-18 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue. ---------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-02 mini-Houskeeping Notes 1. If you would like to host an AIR seminar/slide show in: a. NEW YORK CITY in April or May, or b. the LOUISVILLE/CINCINNATI area the week of May 10 please get in touch ASAP: 2. The Intel International Science & Engineering Fair for high school students, which will be held in Louisville that week, is in need of judges. To wield immense power over tomorrow's scientists, e-mail T.H. Crawford ---------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-03 What's New in AIR Here are some alluring abstracts from the next issue of The Annals of Improbable Research (AIR). Volume 3, number 2 (the Mar/Apr 97 issue) of AIR is our Annual Swimsuit Issue -- complete with unexpected lavish photos of this year's crop of scientific swimsuit sweeties: Al Teich and his Speedo; Vickie Roberts and her iguanas; and Paul Berghoff and someone else's mud. Other features in the issue include (in addition to those listed in last month's mini-AIR) include: * Anti-Optimal Foraging by Wile E. Coyote," by Conrad Toepfer. An analysis of the curiously inefficient foraging habits of one species of coyote. The animal's feeding strikes seldom, if ever, result in success. Moreover, in a majority of cases, these strikes incur injury for the hunter. * "K is for Potassium," by Greg Fishbone. This script for the television series "Sesame Street" introduces a new character who would be able to counter the scientific misinformation being presented by existing characters on the show. * "Improbable Soccer Science," by Pelee Bailey. A review of the medical and other research literature pertaining to the game of soccer, including looks at the dangers of goals, boots, and other paraphernalia, and the risks asthmatics incur when watching the game. * "Ask Symmetra," by scientist/supermodel Symmetra. In this issue's column, Symmetra uses basic physics principals to allay a reader's concern about the future of grandfather and his rocking chair. And much, much more... Full text and illustrations of these and many other articles and citations appear in the Mar/Apr AIR. mini-AIR (which you are reading at this moment) is but a hint of what's in the print publication. As always, we liltingly beseech you to subscribe to the real thing -- and to submit your own research for publication. ---------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-04 Face Value Our project to collect unusual units of measurement has become clogged. The slow-down is rooted, as you might expect, in sex. More than 3200 years after she reportedly inspired the Trojan War, Helen continues to exert a facinated fascination on mankind. Helen's face, or at least the beauty of that face, is said to have launched 1000 ships on their military errand.. A multitude and a half of male respondents have made a point of telling us that the "helen" is (in the words of investigators John Lloyd and Joe Burch) a "unit of pulchritude." Thus, the milli-helen would be a measure of more ordinary beauty. Various of these male investigators claim to have coined the term "milli-helen." Others report, and who are we to doubt them, that specific other individuals should be credited with the idea. Each of the reports credits a different person. Tri-millennial (and then some) Helen -- her beauty doth lead men's minds to imaginings... ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-05 Fat Chance The Coalition for Excess Weight Risk Education (CEWRE) has released its National Weight Report, which ranks the 33 largest metropolitan areas in the US by percentage of obese residents. CEWRE describes itself as "an alliance of professional and voluntary health associations and corporate members." Be that as it may, the CEWRE study overlooks the questions of greatest interest to students. Therefore... We hereby announce the first annual AIR Obesity Index of Colleges and Universities. Please send the completed survey form to 1. What is the name and location of your college or university? 2. What percentage of your instructors are overweight? 3. Do you think fat teachers are better than skinny teachers? 4. What percentage of your fellow students are overweight? 5. Is there too much fat in your education? ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-06 Scientist Stereotypes Investigator Chana Lajcher of the Jerusalem College of Technology reports on her analysis of science stereotypes: I worked for a number of years at a large Israeli university science library (no, I won't mention names). We were usually able to guess the department of the students coming to the desk by just looking at them: Young married women, usually pregnant or with a baby in tow, were biology undergrads. Young males, looking lost, not knowing what book they wanted (They'd come to the desk saying, "Um, Is this the library? I need the book, for the course, you know..."), were pharmacology students doing their one botany course. Elderly library patrons, usually a bit eccentric, were researchers at the herbarium looking for very rare botany books which they would discover had been checked out ten years previously by one of their colleagues (and not yet returned but they promise they'll bring it in the minute we phone them - if the other reader needs it as much as they do). Young healthy males, were chemistry undergrads. Students grading stacks of exams were physics grad students (working part-time as teaching assistants). Math was in a different library so I have no stereotypes (oops I meant data) for them. ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-07 More Smartypants Here are further observations gleaned from the Project Smartypants survey (which field has the smartest, or believes it has the smartest, people?), the results of which were summarized in last month's mini-AIR. Astronomer Vinay L. Kashyap: Speaking of ranking the various disciplines -- Politicians think they are Economists. Economists think they are Social Scientists. Social Scientists think they are Psychologists. Psychologists think they are Biologists. Biologists think they are Organic Chemists. Organic Chemists think they are Physical Chemists. Physical Chemists think they are Physicists. Physicists think they are Mathematicians. Mathematicians think they are God. God ...umm... so happens that God is an Astronomer. Geographer Wolf Roder: Back when my daughter was studying at Caltech it was *known* that astronomers (future) were those who could not make it in physics. Biochemist Lex Kwee: Engineering ranks itself pretty high and could beat Physics in a man to man contest, because they would bring more appropriate weaponry. Pam Sexton, who did not identify her field: I can't say who is smarter, but I did have a physicist boss once who described chemists as the "lowest form of scientific life". Astronomer Duncan Steele: I was once at a seminar about some obscure branch of mathematics. (Actually I wasn't: I heard about this from someone who may, or may not, have been there. If it ever actually occurred). The lecturer drew some bizarre diagram on the board, whereupon a puzzled member of the audience put up his hand and said that he couldn't understand which way was up, and which down. The lecturer replied: "I am from Cambridge: hence all other directions are down." This proves beyond all reasonable doubt that mathematicians - at least those from Cambridge - think of themselves as being on the top of the heap. Mathematician Fredrik Mansfeld: I'm a mathematician working as a computer scientist. Since I am of the purest academic discipline of them all I can assure you that my opinions are completely objective and unbiased. Physicist and penguinist Karen Lingel: Those Rocket Scientists are so damn smug, because they are so highly rated by the moronic public! It makes me sick. ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-08 Interlingual Universal History (Czech) Eric Schulman's "The History of the Universe in 200 Words or Less," which was originally published in the Jan/Feb 1997 issue of The Annals of Improbable Research, has been translated into Czech. You can see it on the Web at "http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~eschulma/histczech2.html" There are several hundred languages to go in the Universal History Translation Project. If you would like to translate the article into one of those languages, please contact Dr. Schulman at . ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-09 Cloning Update Here are this month's cloning announcements from the AIR Research Laboratories. 1. We have successfully cloned the bacterium E. coli. 2. A team under the direction of MIT researcher Jim Propp is combining the latest in cloning research with recent advances in physics: b. As the world knows, Scottish scientists have figured out how to create large numbers (well, at least one) of identical sheep; a. Not long ago, some of Propp's colleagues figured out how to create coherent beams of matter-particles (rather than just photons). Propp is combining these ideas to produce the sheep-laser. As yet, he has not settled on a proper name for the technique ("Livestock Amplification through ..." is as far as he has gotten). In a second project, Propp is working to create a Bose condensate of identical sheep. ---------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-10 Call for Ig Nominations If you have nominations for the 1997 Ig Nobel Prizes, please send them in. As always the criterion is simple. Prizes are given "for achievements that cannot or should not be reproduced." For a complete list of previous year's winners, see our web site http://www.improb.com ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-11 Scientific Correctness: Zippy Travel Here is the report on our SCIENTIFIC CORRECTNESS SURVEY #2. The question was: Is faster-than-light travel possible? This survey drew an onslaught of opinions. The vote was a landslide (72%) for the YES side. Thus, another controversy is put to rest. Henceforth, it will be scientifically correct to believe that faster-than-light travel is possible. Opinions ranged from positive to negative, and from simple ("Yes") to hideously complex. While the results are interesting, the variety of methods used to obtain them is dazzling. * * * Some readers used fuzzy logic: I have never really believed that light actually goes at the speed of light. Have we any proof? I worked out that it should go at root two times the speed of light (c) making the constant itself irrelevant. --Graeme Winter * * * Other readers used higher-level fuzzy logic: This is an interesting question, coincidentally I was driving through a Minnesota blizzard last week when my wife told me to slow down because I was 'over driving my headlights.' I was so excited I almost spilled my coffee because I thought that she meant I was traveling faster than the speed of light, but then I realized that she meant that because of the poor conditions, the stopping distance for my car was greater than my visibility. --Don Berryman * * * One reader used tangential logic: Since light has yet to dawn on school boards here in Texas, we are unable to answer this question. --Julia Frugoli * * * Some took a theoretical bent: Yes, but no matter what the destination, you always arrive at night. --Dick Baker My fraternity brother Charles Jones (MIT '63) created a faster- than-light vehicle in 1960. A beam of light is reflected in a mirror. Approaching the mirror, the light's velocity is (+)c. After reflection it is -c. Ergo at the instant of reflection, its velocity is 0. When the vehicle passes the mirror, it goes faster than light. --A. D. Snider * * * Others relied on advanced theories: Faster than light travel IS possible but only if you are facing backwards. --Charles Belair It depends on how fast the light is going. --Michael Castleman * * * Some readers cited empirical evidence: Of course. It is demonstrated every week in "Star Trek: The Next Generation". They also demonstrate crystal power, telepathy, reversal of the polarity of neutron fluxes in starboard power couplings, and other facets of modern science. --Stephen Trier No. No no no no no no. Most people think Star Trek has solved the problem of faster-than-light travel. I am much more fascinated by Star Trek's solution to the sound-in-a-vacuum problem. --Karen Lingel "Yes!" E-mail uses delivery through electrical circuits, therefore traveling at the speed of light (one of the reasons for its popularity over the historically traditional US Postal "Service"). America OnLine uses these same electrical circuits. It is well known that almost anything travels faster than AOL these days. --G. Borochoff * * * Not everyone relied on intellectual arguments. Two readers, Charlie Cerf and Peter Thorp, sent in variants of the same classical argument: There was a young lady called Bright who could travel much faster than light. She departed one day in a relative way and returned on the previous night * * * Practical experience, too, was useful in solving the question: Of course faster-than-light travel is possible. However, the probability that your luggage will wind up at the wrong destination increases as the cube of the velocity. --Bob O'Hara Yes. Faster than light travel is possible and can be readily demonstrated by making the mistake of having two dates show up at your place at the same time. I've done this and witnessed first hand the flight, which happens so fast that you can't see it. --P. Hughes Yes, but tickets must be purchased at least three weeks in advance and a Saturday night stay is required. --Kristina Pawlikowski After my cat decided it was play time at 3 AM, he was forcefully accelerated from the bed. Quickly, his velocity reached the of light resulting in a mid-air white hot flash of spontaneous combustion (matter to energy.) Conversely, all internal energies (neuroelectrical, biochemical, etc.) were converted to matter. A strange ash covered the room, very similar to scoopable litter. The other possibility is that he landed on my camera equipment and has been hiding ever since. --Don Copeland * * * Finally, one response defied categorization: Of course, as a physics teacher I tell my students that faster- than-light travel is impossible, but that's just to crush their spirits. --LaNelle Ohlhausen ------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-12 AIRhead Project 2000 Since June, 1994, we have been compiling a list of everything that has 2000 as part of its name. Here are some items plucked randomly from the collection: ITEM K99-05 (submitted by investigator Ron Josephson) "Disco 2000," a dance competition in a nightclub in Oranjestad, Aruba. ITEMS BPK2190-2200 (submitted by investigator Ralph Bearpark) These items are all to be found in Switzerland. "Beauty Center 2000," a hair & beauty shop in Zurich. "Coiffeur 2000," a hairdresser in Zurich. "Coiffure Esthetic 2000," a hairdresser in Winterthur. "Creation 2000," a hairdresser in Geneva. "Deux mille," a hairdresser in Lausanne. "Dimension 2000," a hairdresser in La Chaux-de-Fonds. "Esthetic 2000," a hairdresser in Winterthur. "Esthetique 2000," a beauty salon in La Chaux-de-Fonds. "Hair 2000," a hairdresser in Zurich. "Look 2000," a hairdresser in Montreux. ----------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-13 May We Recommend Research reports that merit a trip to the library. (These items are additional to the many which appear in the pages of AIR itself.) QUANTIFYING THE CRAVED "Measurement of the Olfactive Intensity of Chocolates by Differential Olfactometry," B. Plumas, L. Hashim and H. Chaveron, "Food Control," vol. 7, no. 3, 1996, pp. 117-20. (Thanks to Barak Pearlmutter for bringing this to our attention.) BEACH BLANKET SURPRISES "Diversity of Microfungi in The Sandy Soil of Ipanema Beach, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil," Maria Inez de Moura Sarquis, and Pedrina Cunha de Oliveira, "Journal of Basic Microbiology," v. 36, no. 1, 1996, p. 51. (Thanks to Jorg Meyer-Stamer for bringing this to our attention.) MADNESS, CORRECTLY Last month's mini-AIR contained a typo-laden citation (big surprise, huh?). The correct citation is: "Images of Madness in the Films of Walt Disney," Allan Beveridge, "Psychiatric Bulletin," vol. 20, 1996, pp. 618-20. ------------------------------------------------------------ 1997-03-14 AIRhead Events ==> Updates of this schedule are available from info@improb.com Want to host an event? E-mail to marca@wilson.harvard.edu MGH CANCER CENTER, Charlestown, MA Tuesday, Mar 18, noon Seminar/slide show on Improbable Research and the Ig Nobel Prizes. Molecular Oncology, Bldg. 149, 7th Floor, 13th St. Info: Josh La Baer 617-726-7800 STRANGE UNIVERSE some time soon The syndicated television program "Strange Universe" is preparing a report about AIR and the Ig Nobel Prizes. The report will probably be broadcast some time in late March or early April. AUSTRALIAN SCIENCE FESTIVAL Sunday, April 20 National Convention Centre, Canberra, approx. noon AIR editorial board member Wendy Cooper will present an illustrious, illustrated seminar on improbable research. Info: SIGMA XI, Louisville, KY Monday, May 12 Seminar/slide show on Improbable Research and the Ig Nobel Prizes. Info: Lawrence Gettleman SEVENTH FIRST ANNUAL IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY Thurs, Oct 9 Sanders Theatre, Harvard University. Tickets will go on sale in August. ---------------------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-15 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) Here's how to subscribe to the magnificent bi-monthly print journal The Annals of Improbable Research -- (the real thing, not just the little bits of overflow material you have been reading here in mini-AIR) ................................................................ Name: Address: Address: City and State: Zip or postal code: Country Phone: FAX: E-mail: ................................................................ USA 1 year/$23 2 years/$39 Canada/Mexico 1 year/$27 US 2 years/$45 US Overseas 1 year/$40 US 2 years/$70 US [Copies of back issues are each $8 in the USA, $11 in Canada/Mexico, $16 overseas.] ................................................................ Send payment (US bank check, or international money order, or Visa, Mastercard or Discover info) to: The Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 air@improb.com ----------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-16 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) What you are reading right now is mini-AIR. It is NOT a tiny version of AIR -- rather, it is overflow from the real magazine. To subscribe, send a brief E-mail message to: LISTPROC@AIR.HARVARD.EDU The body of your message should contain ONLY the words SUBSCRIBE MINI-AIR MARIE CURIE (You may substitute your own name for that of Madame Curie.) ---------------------------- To stop subscribing, send the following message: SIGNOFF MINI-AIR To obtain a list of back issues, send this message: INDEX MINI-AIR To retrieve a particular back issue, send a message specifying which issue you want. For example, to retrieve the issue dated 950706, send this message: GET MINI-AIR MINI-AIR.950706 ----------------------------------------------------- 1997-03-17 Our Address (*) The Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 EDITORIAL: marca@wilson.harvard.edu GENERAL INFO (supplied automatically): info@improb.com SUBSCRIPTIONS: air@improb.com WORLD WIDE WEB: http://www.improb.com/ We read everything we receive, but are unable to answer all of it. If you need a reply, please include your Internet address and/or a SASE in all printed correspondence. From time to time AIRhead news reports and commentary appear on ABC Television's "World News Now" and Public Radio's "Living on Earth." ELSEWHERE ON THE NET: * USENET: a weekly column appears in clari.tw.columns.imprb_research --------------------------- 1997-03-18 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes. ------------------------------------------------------------ (c) copyright 1997, The Annals of Improbable Research ------------------------------------------------------------ ------------- mini-AIRheads ------------- EDITOR: Marc Abrahams (marca@wilson.harvard.edu) MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS: Wendy Mattson WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin (ringo@leland.stanford.edu) http://www.improb.com/ COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen (eigen@neu.edu) ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne CO-CONSPIRATORS: Gary Dryfoos, Craig Haggart, Deb Kreuze, Nicki Sorel MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts ============================================================