Ig Nobel awards put spotlight on wacky research
Ig Nobel awards put spotlight on wacky research
By: Bill Mead
Topics:
Posted by editor Tue Nov 30, 1999 00:00:00 PST
Viewed 646 times
0 responses 0 comments If you think that finding out why woodpeckers don't get headaches is a burning need, you'll be glad to know that two guys who actually did find out have won an international prize, given at Harvard University no less.
It was one of many Ig Nobel awards recently given to scientists who have labored to answer questions nobody asked or who have perfected gadgets nobody needs. According to newspaper accounts, the Ig Nobel awards are the brainchild of a magazine called Annals of Improbable Research, which sounds like a joke itself but apparently is for real. The seriousness of the Ig Nobel program is emphasized by the fact that the awards are presented by actual winners of Nobel prizes, the real McCoy from Stockholm.
I bring this useless news to your attention so you will stop saying that geniuses tend to be humorless. Not even the maddest scientist could keep a straight face upon learning that among the Ig Nobel winners this year are apparently genuine medical researchers who produced an explosive report on “Termination of Intractable Hiccups with Digital Rectal Massage.” The possibilities raised by this strange document probably won't sound funny, though, to anybody who has suffered persistent hiccups just before having to sing the national anthem in front of the entire student body. I have no idea how the massage should be done so don't call me for a show and tell. Personally I'll continue to battle hiccups by breathing into a paper sack and you keep your hands to yourself.
It's unfair to say all Ig Nobel award winners are comic figures, though. In some cases their work actually produces results that meet some people's strongest desires. For example, one of this year's winners was honored for inventing a teenager repellent, a device that emits an unbearable screech audible only to adolescents. This, too, seems to be on the level. The inventor's name, by the way, is Howard Stapleton in case you want to send a thank-you card.
I don't mean to belittle his achievement but my wife and I have survived the teenage years of three kids and six grandkids with no ill effects. We would do it all over again if we could and without Howard's screech box.
The Ig Nobel awards go on and on, some of them truly irrelevant in my opinion. Like the two entomologists who figured out that dung beetles are finicky about the dung. As far as I'm concerned, that's the beetles' problem and I'm not about to help them find better stuff.
Also in my “who cares?” file is the award-winning discovery that female malaria mosquitoes are attracted equally to limburger cheese and to the smell of human feet. Nor do I see much benefit in giving Ig Nobel awards to three guys who experimented to find out why people hate the sound of fingernails on a blackboard. They said it's the audio frequency level that makes nearly everybody cringe. Like knowing that will do any good?
I'm planning to enter the Ig Nobel competition next year. I propose to solve the mystery of why your radiator cap never reaches the ground when you drop it in the engine compartment.
| Send to a Friend | Report a Violation |
