PLEASE FORWARD/POST AS APPROPRIATE ================================================================ mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR") Issue Number 2002-09 September, 2002 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 ================================================================ ----------------------------- 2002-09-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2002-09-01 Table of Contents 2002-09-02 Soon... 2002-09-03 What's New in the Magazine 2002-09-04 Smelly Limerick Competition 2002-09-05 Ig Delegation? 2002-09-06 THE BUSSEN REPORT: Bussen 2002-09-07 Auto Auto 2002-09-08 Pithy Exemplars 2002-09-09 Outstandingly Obscure: Happiness 2002-09-10 Outstandingly Obscure: Grumpiness 2002-09-11 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Troy, Boring, G. Science, Hair 2002-09-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Like -- What's to Like 2002-09-13 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Missing Missives, Brush-Look-Up 2002-09-14 AIRhead Events 2002-09-15 How to Subscribe to AIR (*) 2002-09-16 Our Address (*) 2002-09-17 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*) 2002-09-18 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 ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-02 Soon... The Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony will occur on THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3 For info about TICKETS COMING AS A DELEGATION the INTERNET TELECAST the LIVE RADIO TELECAST, the 10/4 Ig Lectures at Harvard Sch. of Public Health the 10/5 Ig Lectures at MIT see ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-03 What's New in the Magazine AIR 8:5 (September/October 2002) is the special SMELLY ISSUE. It will be arriving from the printer any day now. Highlights include: <> "Research to Sniff At," by Benton Broak. A quick tour of unexpectedly diverse smelly research published over the past two decades. <> "Feldman's Learning Theory," by Jeff Silverstein. A personal remembrance of the curious, and curiously fragrant, teaching methods of a beloved, and sometimes misunderstood, history professor. <> "The Lighter Side of a Life in Science" (first of two parts), by Duncan C. Blanchard. The author looks back on some of the quirks, pranks, and cranks that made his career so enjoyable. <> "The Mystery of the Yellow Cake," by Ernest Ersatz. An attempt to make sense of some puzzling basic aspects of a strange article called "The Yellow Cake" that was published in a respected mathematical journal. <> ASK SYMMETRA: How to Say? (Cheese) -- scientist/supermodel Symmetra. AIR's advice columnist takes on another difficult problem that bedeviled a reader. ...and much, much more. The entire table of contents is on-line at (What you are reading at this moment is mini-AIR, a small, monthly e-mail supplement to the print magazine.) ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-04 Smelly Limerick Competition We invite you to participate in the SMELLY LIMERICK COMPETITION. To enter, compose a limerick that elucidates this research report (which was brought to our attention by investigator Tom Gill): "Characterization of Emissions From Burning Incense," J.J. Jetter, Z. Guo, J.A. McBrian, M.R. Flynn, The Science of the Total Environment, vol. 295, nos. 1-3, August 5, 2002, pp 51-67. RULES: New limericks only. One entry max per person. The winning smelly limerick's author will receive a free, odor-enhanced copy of the Annals of Improbable Research. Send your entry to: SMELLY LIMERICK COMPETITION c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-05 Ig Delegation? If you are coming to the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony with a group of six or more people, and want to be officially acknowledged and celebrated, please register as an Official Delegation. Delegations that have already registered include The Museum of Bad Art; the Junior Scientists; Lawyers For and Against Jargon; The Square Root Society of Omaha, Nebraska; The Harvard Bureaucracy Club; and The Pencil Eraser Collecting Society of Eastern Europe. To become an official delegation: FIRST purchase tickets for all the members of your group. THEN register your delegation with Louise Sacco, Grand Panjandrum of the Delegations (PHONE: 781 444-6757, email ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-06 THE BUSSEN REPORT: Bussen Congratulations to Investigator Joseph Omer Bussen. His latest dispatch from the field brings welcome (to him) news. He writes In my continuing search for improbable research by persons with the same unusual surname as myself, I came across the following: "ANORECTAL PULL-THROUGH AND VECTOR VOLUME MANOMETRY," S.M. Freys, K.H. Fuchs, D. Bussen, and A. Thiede, Zentralblatt Fur Chirurgie, vol. 121, no. 8, 1996, pp. 652-8. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-07 Auto Auto We recently had a distant, but not distant enough, encounter with the auto-responder of Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. The following message arrived in our e-mail box, unexpected, unsolicited, but clamoring for attention and a good home: From: Graduate Application Autoresponder Thank you for your recent e-mail inquiry regarding Graduate Studies at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Because of the large number of inquiries that we receive each day, this response has been generated automatically. To our knowledge, Rose-Hulman is the very first Institute of Technology that generates not only its own responses but also its own inquiries. We would be interested to learn of other self-sufficient educational institutions that practice the self-Socratic method. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-08 Pithy Exemplars Here are the blue-ribbon entries for last month's two writing assignments. ASSIGNMENT #1 was: Write a 100-word story that begins this quotation from the Boston Globe: "They forced me out without having any other liver transplant surgeon on staff," Katz said in an interview. "That's irresponsible to the patients. And if I'm a professional surgeon doing my job well, is it really appropriate to remove me? And to do it by isolating, manipulating, backstabbing, cheating and lying?" The top grade for ASSIGNMENT #1 goes to Investigator Mike Slind, who composed this headline: ==> "What am I . . . ?" Chopped Liver Surgeon Pleads ASSIGNMENT #2 was: Devise a suitable title for the complete short short story that was told by these four headlines that were listed one-after-the-other on the CNN web site: * Shock Jocks' Sex Stunt Prompts Investigation * Microsoft Discloses 'Critical' Security Flaws * Scientists: Giant METEORITE SLAMMED YOUNG EARTH * Report: Third Child for Michael Jackson The top grade for ASSIGNMENT #2 goes to Investigator Gary Dryfoos, who produced this headline: ==> "All's Well That Ends Well" ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-09 Outstandingly Obscure: Happiness The OUTSTANDINGLY OBSCURE ACADEMIC JOURNALS project continues to stockpile new entries. INVESTIGATOR LOU LIPPMAN offers up THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LISTENING. INVESTIGATOR WOLF RODER offers up CORRELATION: JOURNAL OF RESEARCH INTO ASTROLOGY (ISSN: 0260-8790). Roder explains that "with eleven PhD's among consulting editors they must be serious." To submit a new entry, send pertinent info to: OUTST. OBSCURE JOURNALS c/o or OUTST. OBSCURE JOURNALS c/o ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-10 Outstandingly Obscure: Grumpiness Not everyone was as cheerful as INVESTIGATORS LIPPMAN and RODER. Objections many, varied, and furious crept, crawled, clambered, strode, and/or marched in about several journals listed here last month. Investigator T.J. TOBIN speaks for and against many in complaining about the BEE VENOM THERAPY JOURNAL: INVESTIGATOR BOB GULIEN seems to have mistaken a personal journal (i.e., a diary or daily log of one person's experiences) for an academic journal (a periodic publication meant to report the activities of a corporate entity). This seems to disqualify the BEE VENOM THERAPY JOURNAL from consideration in the "Obscure Journal" list. *** Official ruling: INVESTIGATOR TOBIN is correct. INVESTIGATOR J.B. SCHWARZ amplifies the distressed calls of many Esperanto-speaking investigators in pointing out that: The "journal" which INVESTIGATOR DAVID HUBBLE submitted, "ESPERANTO SUB LA SUDA KRUCO" (he misspelled it, incidentally), is not an academic journal. It's simply the newsletter of the Esperanto association in Australia. INVESTIGATOR R.O. DUCHENNE put it more simply: Shame on INVESTIGATOR DAVID HUBBLE. Shame, shame, shame. *** Official ruling: INVESTIGATORS TOBIN, DUCHENNE, et al., are correct -- perhaps not in their aspersions and intimations about the character of INVESTIGATOR DAVID HUBBLE, but certainly about the unsuitability of the publication for this project. ---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-11 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Not a Bulldozer, Babe Ruth Here are concise, incomplete, flighty mentions of some of the features we've posted on HotAIR since last month's mini-AIR came out. See them by clicking "WHAT'S NEW" at the web site, or go to: ==> Troy Meets Not Quite a Bulldozer, and Vice Versa ==> The Directional Boring Advantage ==> (Many new additions to) The Science of G. Bush ==> Marvels and Pipes ==> Fat and Dust ==> Strife About Rife ==> Babe Ruth Psychology ==> Thong Laterality Theory ==> New Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club members! THESE, AND MORE, ARE ON HOTAIR AT ----------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Like -- What's to Like Each month we select for your special attention a research report that seems especially worth a close read. Your librarian will enjoy being asked for a copy. Here is this month's Pick of the Month: A LOT OF LIKE "Like: The Discourse Particle and Semantics," Muffy E. A. Siegel, Journal of Semantics, vol. 19, no. 1, February 2002, pp. 35-71. The author, who is at Temple University, explains her work thusly: I show that, due to its formal properties, like can be interpreted only during the assignment of model-theoretic denotations to expressions, along the lines of Lasersohn's (1999) pragmatic haloes. ----------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-13 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Missing Missives, Brush-Look-Up AGRI-VIBES "Acoustical Properties of Farmland," K. Attenborough, T. Waters- Fuller, K.M. Li , and J. A. Lines, Journal of Agricultural Engineering Research, vol. 76, No. 2, June 1, 2000, pp. 183-95. (Thanks to Tom Gill for bringing this to our attention.) COMPLEX DIVINATION OF INTENT "Assessing Attitudes Toward Gay Marriage Among Selected Christian Groups Using the Lost-Letter Technique," I.M. Waugh, E.V. Plake, and B.M. Rienzi, Psychological Reports, vol. 86, no. 1, February 2000, pp. 215-8. (Thanks to Christina Zondervan for bringing this to our attention.) COORDINATED EYE MOVEMENT "Elevation of One Eye During Tooth Brushing," I. Gottlob, S. Jain and E.C. Engle, American Journal of Ophthalmology, vol. 134, no. 3; September 2002, pp. 459-60. (Thanks to John D. Bullough for bringing this to our attention.) The authors describe an unusual patient: During tooth brushing her right eye elevated beyond midline. This was elicited only by touching her teeth or gums but not by mouth movements. NON-ODDITY IN ODDITY IN MONKEY "Non Oddity Solution of an Oddity Problem in the Rhesus Monkey (Macaca mulatta)," C.M. Contreras and R.E. Bowman, Boletin de Estudios Medicos y Biologicos, vol. 33, nos. 1-8, 1984-85, pp. 25- 31. ------------------------------------------------------------ 2002-09-14 AIRhead Events ==> For details and updates see ==> Want to host an event? 617-491-4437 12TH 1ST ANNUAL IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY -- THUR, OCT 3, 2002 Sanders Theatre, Harvard University INFO: IG MEDICAL LECTURES -- FRI, OCT 4, 2002 3:00 pm. Harvard School of Public Health, Snyder Auditorium FREE. INFO: IG INFORMAL LECTURES -- SAT, OCT 5, 2002 Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Room 54-100 1:00 pm. FREE. INFO: AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, DENVER -- FEBRUARY, 2003 Special Annals of Improbable Research session at the Annual Meeting of the American Assn for the Advancement of Science. Featuring: * AIR Editor MARC ABRAHAMS * 2001 Ig Nobel Biology Prize winner BUCK WEIMER * 1994 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize co-winner RICHARD DART and others TBA MICHIGAN TECH, HOUGHTON, MI -- APRIL 8, 2003 8:00 PM, Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts INFO: Valerie Pegg, vepegg@mtu.edu, 906-487-2844 http://www.greatevents.mtu.edu/main.html -------------------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-15 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've been reading in this newsletter). ................................................................ Name: Address: Address: City and State: Zip or postal code: Country Phone: FAX: E-mail: ................................................................ SUBSCRIPTIONS (6 issues per year): USA 1 yr/$29 2 yrs/$53 Canada/Mexico 1 yr/$33 US 2 yrs/$57 US Overseas 1 yr/$45 US 2 yrs/$82 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 ----------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-16 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: --------------------------- 2002-09-17 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: Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, S. Drew MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts (c) copyright 2002, Annals of Improbable Research ----------------------------------------------------- 2002-09-18 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 ============================================================