My fake plastic love
September 13, 2024 12:25 PM Subscribe
The 2024 Ig Nobel Prizes have been announced! This year's theme: Murphy's Law.
Death by pigeon! Life imitating artificial life! Hair swirls! Improving placebos! Dead fish swimming! Reverse farting? Coin flip odds! Drunk earthworms! Old people and bad record keeping! Cows spewing milk!
Alternate title: Not just blowing smoke up people's asses
The official winners page is much more terse.
Details of the 34th First Annual Ig Nobel Ceremony, including a webcast! It's a return to doing it in a big room with an audience, after four years.
Alternate title: Not just blowing smoke up people's asses
The official winners page is much more terse.
Details of the 34th First Annual Ig Nobel Ceremony, including a webcast! It's a return to doing it in a big room with an audience, after four years.
As I read the post, I was thinking this was the Darwin Awards and questioning if I want to read about someone dying from reverse farts. Thank goodness it is just a scientific study.
posted by soelo at 12:56 PM on September 13 [4 favorites]
posted by soelo at 12:56 PM on September 13 [4 favorites]
B.F. Skinner, for experiments to see the feasibility of housing live pigeons inside missiles to guide the flight paths of the missiles.
This is an old one?
There was understandably a great deal of skepticism about the viability of using pigeons for missile guidance; at one point, Skinner lamented, his team "realized that a pigeon was more easily controlled than a physical scientist serving on a committee." But Skinner's team persisted, and in 1944, they finally got the chance to demonstrate Project Pigeon for a committee of top scientists and show that the birds' behavior could be controlled. The sample pigeon behaved perfectly. "But the spectacle of a living pigeon carrying out its assignment, no matter how beautifully, simply reminded the committee of how utterly fantastic our proposal was." Apparently, there was much "restrained merriment." Even though this novel homing device was resistant to jamming, could react to a wide variety of target practice, needed no scarce materials, and was so simple to make that production could start in 30 days, the committee nixed the project.
It worked?!?!
Jacob White and Felipe Yamashita, for finding evidence that some real plants imitate the shapes of neighboring artificial plastic plants.
Copycats! *hums Fake Plastic Trees*
James C. Liao, for demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout.
Bizarrely made more sense when you read about it.
many mammals are capable of breathing through their anus.
"Both treatments were pretty darned effective at staving off respiratory failure with no major complications. The authors think this could work in human patients, too. We're suddenly feeling particularly motivated to keep up with our COVID boosters and mask up in crowded public spaces."
........
using chromatography to separate drunk and sober worms.
This was a need why....?
Fordyce Ely and William E. Petersen, for exploding a paper bag next to a cat that’s standing on the back of a cow, to explore how and when cows spew their milk.
Again, made more sense when you read about it.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:23 PM on September 13 [3 favorites]
This is an old one?
There was understandably a great deal of skepticism about the viability of using pigeons for missile guidance; at one point, Skinner lamented, his team "realized that a pigeon was more easily controlled than a physical scientist serving on a committee." But Skinner's team persisted, and in 1944, they finally got the chance to demonstrate Project Pigeon for a committee of top scientists and show that the birds' behavior could be controlled. The sample pigeon behaved perfectly. "But the spectacle of a living pigeon carrying out its assignment, no matter how beautifully, simply reminded the committee of how utterly fantastic our proposal was." Apparently, there was much "restrained merriment." Even though this novel homing device was resistant to jamming, could react to a wide variety of target practice, needed no scarce materials, and was so simple to make that production could start in 30 days, the committee nixed the project.
It worked?!?!
Jacob White and Felipe Yamashita, for finding evidence that some real plants imitate the shapes of neighboring artificial plastic plants.
Copycats! *hums Fake Plastic Trees*
James C. Liao, for demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout.
Bizarrely made more sense when you read about it.
many mammals are capable of breathing through their anus.
"Both treatments were pretty darned effective at staving off respiratory failure with no major complications. The authors think this could work in human patients, too. We're suddenly feeling particularly motivated to keep up with our COVID boosters and mask up in crowded public spaces."
........
using chromatography to separate drunk and sober worms.
This was a need why....?
Fordyce Ely and William E. Petersen, for exploding a paper bag next to a cat that’s standing on the back of a cow, to explore how and when cows spew their milk.
Again, made more sense when you read about it.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:23 PM on September 13 [3 favorites]
Love the Ig Nobels, and their original motto of discoveries "that cannot, or should not, be reproduced."
posted by Melismata at 1:23 PM on September 13
posted by Melismata at 1:23 PM on September 13
> Copycats! *hums Fake Plastic Trees*
(waggles eyebrows at the title, nods approvingly, fingerguns)
posted by Pronoiac at 1:31 PM on September 13
(waggles eyebrows at the title, nods approvingly, fingerguns)
posted by Pronoiac at 1:31 PM on September 13
questioning if I want to read about someone dying from reverse farts. Thank goodness it is just a scientific study.
My best friend swears up and down that in high school she was part of a small group of students who decided to test the old canard that farts are flammable.
She held the match and a notoriously gassy classmate supplied the fart.
And it turned out they are flammable! — but the flame somehow went up inside him, she says, and though he suffered no external burns, he was in so much pain an ambulance was called and he ended up in the ER.
He recovered rapidly and without aftereffects, apparently, but I’m inclined to think that would need to be narrowed to 'without physical aftereffects', and if the whole thing is true, I wonder whether the old canard should be amended to 'farts are a combustible mixture'.
posted by jamjam at 1:51 PM on September 13 [2 favorites]
My best friend swears up and down that in high school she was part of a small group of students who decided to test the old canard that farts are flammable.
She held the match and a notoriously gassy classmate supplied the fart.
And it turned out they are flammable! — but the flame somehow went up inside him, she says, and though he suffered no external burns, he was in so much pain an ambulance was called and he ended up in the ER.
He recovered rapidly and without aftereffects, apparently, but I’m inclined to think that would need to be narrowed to 'without physical aftereffects', and if the whole thing is true, I wonder whether the old canard should be amended to 'farts are a combustible mixture'.
posted by jamjam at 1:51 PM on September 13 [2 favorites]
Traffing might be preferable to mouth to mouth during CPR.
posted by Lenie Clarke at 1:52 PM on September 13
posted by Lenie Clarke at 1:52 PM on September 13
Future posts: remember to check for "Ig Nobel" in addition to "Ig Nobels". I was surprised at how few results came up...
posted by Pronoiac at 1:56 PM on September 13
posted by Pronoiac at 1:56 PM on September 13
I don't know, the ones about plants impersonating things that are impersonating plants, and mammals being able to absorb oxygen through their lower intestines in a pulmonary way, are actually really interesting and amazing.
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:04 PM on September 13 [6 favorites]
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:04 PM on September 13 [6 favorites]
I believe it was learning to inhale through his anus which allowed the French flatulist Le Petomane to achieve his effects.
posted by Paul Slade at 2:10 PM on September 13 [5 favorites]
posted by Paul Slade at 2:10 PM on September 13 [5 favorites]
I've propounded the health benefits of being a bloviating asshole for years, and am delighted to have the science to back it up.
Each one of these is a gem, but I'm particularly sympathetic to the team who flipped coins 350K times which, if my back of the envelope estimates are correct, is at least three hundred hours of coin flipping. That's over six hours of coin flipping per participant. I hope they took before/after images of their thumbnails.
posted by phooky at 2:23 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
Each one of these is a gem, but I'm particularly sympathetic to the team who flipped coins 350K times which, if my back of the envelope estimates are correct, is at least three hundred hours of coin flipping. That's over six hours of coin flipping per participant. I hope they took before/after images of their thumbnails.
posted by phooky at 2:23 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
I hope they took before/after images of their thumbnails.
They did but the details are a bit hard to see because they're only thumbnails.
posted by sleepcrime at 2:40 PM on September 13 [11 favorites]
They did but the details are a bit hard to see because they're only thumbnails.
posted by sleepcrime at 2:40 PM on September 13 [11 favorites]
> actually really interesting and amazing.
The motto of the Igs is "For achievements that first make people LAUGH then make them THINK"
posted by Luddite at 3:10 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
The motto of the Igs is "For achievements that first make people LAUGH then make them THINK"
posted by Luddite at 3:10 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
"...are actually really interesting and amazing."
I liked the one where they warn people about unpleasant side effects of placebos and that makes them work better.
ex: "This will cure/help your [insert] but you may suffer some stomach upset."
posted by aleph at 3:16 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
I liked the one where they warn people about unpleasant side effects of placebos and that makes them work better.
ex: "This will cure/help your [insert] but you may suffer some stomach upset."
posted by aleph at 3:16 PM on September 13 [1 favorite]
My treatment of depression with sour candy continues to gain credence.
That said, any word on reproducibility?
posted by Ziabatsu at 4:22 PM on September 13 [2 favorites]
That said, any word on reproducibility?
posted by Ziabatsu at 4:22 PM on September 13 [2 favorites]
using chromatography to separate drunk and sober worms.
This was a need why....?
Very much not my field, but they were simulating separating active polymers, polymers that change shape or move based on e.g. electric fields or temperature. These are a very active field of research; for example, as artificial muscles in robotics, tactile displays for braille, and in microfluidics such as a drug delivery system or chemical sensors.
When manufacturing these, one of the challenges is separating out the specific polymer you want to get more consistent results - so they've proved you can reliably sort things-that-look-like-a-big-active-polymer through channels based on the level of activity of the pseudo-polymer. It could also help with designing microfluidic devices such as the lab-on-a-chip. By testing how fast drunk worms move.
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 12:36 AM on September 14
This was a need why....?
Very much not my field, but they were simulating separating active polymers, polymers that change shape or move based on e.g. electric fields or temperature. These are a very active field of research; for example, as artificial muscles in robotics, tactile displays for braille, and in microfluidics such as a drug delivery system or chemical sensors.
When manufacturing these, one of the challenges is separating out the specific polymer you want to get more consistent results - so they've proved you can reliably sort things-that-look-like-a-big-active-polymer through channels based on the level of activity of the pseudo-polymer. It could also help with designing microfluidic devices such as the lab-on-a-chip. By testing how fast drunk worms move.
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 12:36 AM on September 14
The plants thing BTW is about a plant that can mimic another in how it looks - without touching it or chemical signalling (given the imitated plant was plastic). Implying the plant can see what the other looks like. One step closer to triffids!
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 12:44 AM on September 14
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 12:44 AM on September 14
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posted by It's Never Lurgi at 12:30 PM on September 13 [8 favorites]