PLEASE FORWARD/POST AS APPROPRIATE ================================================================ mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR") Issue Number 2001-08 August, 2001 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 ================================================================ ----------------------------- 2001-08-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2001-08-01 Table of Contents 2001-08-02 mini-Housekeeping 2001-08-03 What's New in the Magazine 2001-08-04 Project Did-Everything-Work-Out 2001-08-05 Math Rift Widens 2001-08-06 Confusing Times 2001-08-07 Whether Survey 2001-08-08 MONIKER PALINDROMY: Revilo and Kram 2001-08-09 Ig 1 -- Calling All Bridesmaid's Dresses 2001-08-10 Ig 2 -- Live Daedalus and Live Ig Telecast 2001-08-11 Hair Club Growth 2001-08-12 AIR Teachers' Guide 2001-08-13 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Stimulating Boredom, etc. 2001-08-14 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Pick of the Month 2001-08-15 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Purr, Guess, Kaboom 2001-08-16 AIRhead Events 2001-08-17 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) 2001-08-18 Our Address (*) 2001-08-19 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) 2001-08-20 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue. mini-AIR is a free monthly *e-supplement* to AIR, the print magazine ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-02 mini-Housekeeping 1) Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony tickets are now available from the Harvard Box Office (telephone: 617-496-2222). Details are at 2) There will be a special AIR show at Cornell University on September 20. Please spread the word. Details below in section 2001-08-16. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-03 What's New in the Magazine AIR 7:4 (July/August 2001) is a special BEHAVIOR ISSUE. Here are some further highlights: <> "Synchronized Pipetting," by Mary Abraham and Jochen Rink. The authors take a new approach to optimizing laboratory technique. The article is also on-line, at <> "THE SCIENCE LIFE SERIES (Part 7): Myron Crumbacker: Portrait of a Scientist," George Englebretsen. An unauthorized biography of one of science's most insistently apocryphal figures. <> "Tenureclocky," by Dany Adams, with an illustration by Lois Malone. The classic Lewis Carroll poem now has a classic academic politics version. You can see it at <> "Oxidative Stress and the Third Reich," Patrique Roonquel, mentioned here last month, is now on-line at ...and much, much more. The full table of contents and several of the articles are at (What you are reading at this moment is mini-AIR, a small, monthly e-mail supplement to the print magazine.) ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-04 Project Did-Everything-Work-Out We are proud to announce the start of another new AIR research project, Project Did-Everything-Work-Out. The project was born last week when several AIR investigators were lunching in a restaurant. As the meal drew to a close, a dapper, business-like gentleman approached our table and asked us, "Did everything work out for you today?" We recognized that this -- an open-ended, mildly out-of-context question from a confident stranger -- constitutes a powerful social science research technique. Please help us carry out some related research. If you wish to participate in Project Did-Everything-Work-Out, please do the following: PROTOCOL. Dress nicely. Go into a nice restaurant. Walk up to a table full of diners who are nearly done eating their main course. Say "Did everything work out for you today?" Ask them how the service was, then thank them for taking time out from their meal to talk with you. Suggest that, as a way of thanking them, dessert is "on the house" and that when the waiter comes back they should order whatever they like, "tell the waiter that we spoke, and that he should 'comp' it." REPORTING PROCEDURE. Please send a concise (40 words maximum) field research report to: Project Did-Everything-Work-Out c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-05 Math Rift Widens We are now sorry, to some extent, that we last month posed the celebrated mathematics professor's plea for help with the following dilemma: A woman called the math department earlier this year. Her son is in first grade. The first grade teacher said her son was counting wrong. How is 101 pronounced -- "one hundred one" or "one hundred and one"? The teacher told the woman to call any mathematician to find out the proper way to say it. I don't know the answer Many of you insisted that there is a correct answer, and wrote to tell us about it. Now we would like to wash our hands of the whole thing. Why? You will see why when you read the agony column located at ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-06 Confusing Times Disillusioned investigator Edmund von der Burg writes: I've been reading mini-air for a while and always assumed that Marca was some nice lady at Harvard who dealt with all the correspondence. This edition for the first time I read the how-to-subscribe- to-the-magazine bit (I'll be getting a job soon) and realised that tidy, organised, mid-fifties Marca is actually a Marc Abrahams. This is most disappointing. Am I the first to suffer this let down or has it been happening to others? [EDITOR'S NOTE: We extend our sympathy to investigator von der Burg. His age estimate is wrong, but the editor is growing accustomed to such things. Not so long ago the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles issued him a license that declared his sex to be "F".] ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-07 Whether Survey In the Unites States, TV weather forecasters estimate the day's "chance of precipitation," expressed as a percentage -- for example, "a seventy percent chance of rain." In many other countries forecasts are more of the form "expect occasional showers today." The "20 percent chance of rain" kind of forecast is confusing to some people. But confusion aside, are such forecasts accurate? Our Whether Percentage Project is designed to find out. PROTOCOL. We ask you, if you live in a place where the forecasts are done this way, to keep track of the percentage specified in each forecast for a 30 (thirty) day period. Then, for each day, note down whether it actually precipitates as specified in the forecast. REPORTING PROCEDURE. Crunch the data into a concise, readable report that tells how well the weather gibed with the forecasts. Please send your brief (40 words maximum) research report to: Whether Percentage Project c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-08 MONIKER PALINDROMY: Revilo and Kram Several people successfully answered our challenge to unearth, or t least identify, a scientist whose full name is a palindrome. Investigator Jerry Vision writes (and he was echoed by others): I don't know if classicists count, but when I was an undergrad at the University of Illinois, a senior member of the classics dept. was Revilo P. Oliver. He was also infamous for his extreme political views. See Investigator Joseph Omer Bussen writes: Thirty years ago, when I was teaching at Horton Watkins High School in Ladue, Missouri, there was at least one (and perhaps two or three) student named Mark Kram. A quick search of databases revealed this recent paper By a scientist of that name: "Remediation of MTBE- Contaminated Water and Soil," Arturo A. Keller, Sanya Sirivithayapakorn, and Mark Kram, Remediation, vol. 10, no. 1, 1999, pp. 55. [NOTE: Mark Kram's web page is at ] If you know of another palindromically monikered scientist, please send her or his name, along with at least skimpy biographical details, to: MONIKER PALINDROME PROJECT c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-09 Ig 1 -- Calling All Bridesmaid's Dresses PLEASE PASS THIS ITEM ON TO ANYONE WHO MIGHT NEED TO KNOW ABOUT IT If you know someone who wants to get rid of a used bridesmaid's dress, please suggest that she donate it to this year's Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony. The dress will be used there in the 60-second-long wedding ceremony of scientists Lisa Danielson and Will Stefanov. It will also be used in the new scientific mini-opera that will lead up to the wedding. Best of all, the dress will be destroyed afterwards. For info on how to donate a bridesmaid's dress, see ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-10 Ig 2 -- Live Daedalus and Live Ig Telecast TELECAST. It now appears that there WILL be a live Internet telecast of the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony on Thursday evening, October 4. (Thanks to Dave Feldman and the Ig tech crew for taking on the technical challenge!) VIDEO ARCHIVE. And edited video of the ceremony will be posted on line a few days later, thanks to generous assistance from www.BioMedNet.com and www.ChemWeb.com DAEDALUS. We are proud and pleased to announce that David Jones, author of the splendid "Daedalus" column that appears each week in Nature magazine, will do a star turn at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony, and also at the Ig Informal Lectures. (The former will be at Harvard on Oct. 4, the latter at MIT on Oct 6.) Details of that and more are at ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-11 Hair Club Growth The Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists continues to grow. You can see the new members (and the old ones) and their tresses at ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-12 AIR Teachers' Guide This is the start of a new school year. Please pass mini-AIR on to any student or teacher who might be in need. And as we do aperiodically, here again is the AIR Teachers' Guide that appears in every issue of the magazine. * * * Three out of five teachers agree: curiosity is a dangerous thing, especially in students. If you are one of the other two teachers, AIR and mini-AIR can be powerful tools. Choose your favorite hAIR- raising article and give copies to your students. The approach is simple. The scientist thinks that he (or she, or whatever), of all people, has discovered something about how the universe behaves. So: <> Is this scientist right -- and what does "right" mean, anyway? <> Can you think of even one different explanation that works as well or better? <> Did the test really, really, truly, unquestionably, completely test what the author thought she (or he) was testing? <> Is the scientist ruthlessly honest with himself (or herself) about how well his (etc.) idea explains everything, or could he (etc.) be suffering from wishful thinking? <> Some people might say this is foolish. Should you take their word for it? <> Other people might say this is absolutely correct and important. Should you take their word for it? Kids are naturally good scientists. Help them stay that way. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-13 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Stimulating Boredom, etc. Here are concise, incomplete, flighty mentions of some of the features we've posted on HotAIR since last month's mini-AIR came out. You can get to all of them by clicking on "WHAT'S NEW" at the web site, or by going to: ==> The Mathematics of 1950s Dating ==> What is the Rife Resonator? ==> Appreciating the Overlooked (The story of Professor F.) ==> The first in a new series of Authoritative book reviews ==> Can It Get Any Simpler Than This? (A new AIR challenge) ==> Messiness THESE, AND MORE, ARE ON HOTAIR AT ----------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-14 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Pick of the Month Each month we select for your special attention a research report that seems especially worth a close read. This month's selection: PICK OF THE MONTH "A Preliminary Survey of Rhinotillexomania in an Adolescent Sample," Chittaran Andrade and B.S. Srihari, Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, vol. 62, no. 6, June 2001, 426-31. (Thanks to Richard Wassersug, Christine Danilowski, and numerous others for bringing this to our attention.) The authors explain their work: BACKGROUND: Rhinotillexomania is a recent term coined to describe compulsive nose picking. There is little world literature on nose-picking behavior in the general population. METHOD: We studied nose-picking behavior in a sample of 200 adolescents from 4 urban schools. RESULTS: Almost the entire sample admitted to nose picking, with a median frequency of 4 times per day; the frequency was > 20 times per day in 7.6% of the sample. Nearly 17% of subjects considered that they had a serious nose-picking problem.... Occasional nose bleeds complicating nose picking occurred in 25% of subjects. Several interesting findings in specific categories of nose pickers were identified. CONCLUSION: Nose picking is common in adolescents. It is often associated with other habitual behaviors. Nose picking may merit closer epidemiologic and nosologic scrutiny. ----------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-15 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Purr, Guess, Kaboom Here is a further selection of items that merit a trip to the library. SOUND OF SCIENCE "Neural and Mechanical Mechanisms of Feline Purring," J.E. Remmers and H. Gautier, Respiration Physiology, vol. 16, no. 3, December 1972, pp. 351-61. (Thanks to B.L. McTavish for bringing this to our attention.) GUESSED QUEST "Six Hypotheses in Search of a Theorem," Harry Buhrman, Lance Fortnow, and Leen Torenvliet, Proceedings of the 12th IEEE Conference on Computational Complexity, 1997, pp. 2-12. (Thanks to David Molnar and Jan Johannsen for bringing this to our attention.) MORE SUBTLE THAN IT MAY APPEAR "Clinical Features of the Exploding Head Syndrome," J.M. Pearce, Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, vol. 52, no. 7, July 1989, pp. 907-10. The author is at Hull Royal Infirmary, UK. For additional, more extensive lists of citations, subscribe to (or borrow a copy of) the magazine. ------------------------------------------------------------ 2001-08-16 AIRhead Events ==> For details and updates see ==> Want to host an event? 617-491-4437. CORNELL UNIVERSITY THURS, SEPT 20, 2001 AIR editor MARC ABRAHAMS will describe and demonstrate the latest findings in improbable research and the Ig Nobel Prizes, as after- dinner speaker at the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility's annual meeting. The talk is free to the public. INFO: Sandip Tiwari (607)255-2329 (x101) 11th FIRST ANNUAL IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY THURS, OCT 4, 2001 Sanders Theatre, Harvard University With live Internet telecast. INFO: TICKETS: Harvard Box Office (617) 496-2222 noon to 6 pm IG INFORMAL LECTURES SAT, OCT 6, 2001 MIT, room 26-100. 1 pm. Free. David Jones (Nature magazine's "Daedalus") and several of the new Ig Nobel Prize winners explain the universe, to the best of their ability. MARIST COLLEGE, POUGHKEEPSIE, NY WED, DEC 5, 2001 Details TBA SPECIAL AIR SESSION - American Assn. for Advcmnt. of Science at AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, BOSTON FRI EVENING, FEB 15, 2002 -------------------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-17 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: ................................................................ SUBSCRIPTIONS (6 issues per year): USA 1 yr/$24.95 2 yrs/$44.95 Canada/Mexico 1 yr/$28.95 US 2 yrs/$49.95 US Overseas 1 yr/$41.95 US 2 yrs/$71.95 US ................................................................ BACK ISSUES are available, too: First issue: $8 USA, $11 Canada/Mex, $16 overseas Add'l issues purchased at same time: $6 each ................................................................ Send payment (US bank check, or international money order, or Visa, Mastercard or Discover info) to: Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 ----------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-18 Our Address (*) Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 EDITORIAL: marca@chem2.harvard.edu SUBSCRIPTIONS: air@improbable.com WEB SITE: --------------------------- 2001-08-19 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. ------------- mini-AIRheads ------------- EDITOR: Marc Abrahams (marca@chem2.harvard.edu) MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin (airmaster@improbable.com) COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen (eigen@neu.edu) ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne DISTRIBUTIVE EDITOR: Robin Pearce CO-CONSPIRATORS: Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, Craig Haggart, Nicki Rohloff MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts (c) copyright 2001, Annals of Improbable Research ----------------------------------------------------- 2001-08-20 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*) What you are reading right now is mini-AIR. Mini-AIR is a (free!) tiny monthly *supplement* to the bi-monthly print 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 ============================================================