[Humor] The Ig Nobel Prizes Have Been Awarded

[N40GL]

{What are the Ig Nobel Prizes? See next message}

The 2004 Ig Nobel Prizes were awarded at the 14th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, on September 30, at Harvard's Sanders Theatre. Most of the winners were in attendance. Here are the winners:

MEDICINE
Steven Stack of Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, USA and James Gundlach of Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama, USA, for their published report "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide."

PHYSICS
Ramesh Balasubramaniam of the University of Ottawa, and Michael Turvey of the University of Connecticut and Haskins Laboratory, for exploring and explaining the dynamics of hula-hooping.

PUBLIC HEALTH
Jillian Clarke of the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences, and then Howard University, for investigating the scientific validity of the Five-Second Rule about whether it's safe to eat food that's been dropped on the floor.

CHEMISTRY
The Coca-Cola Company of Great Britain, for using advanced technology to convert liquid from the River Thames into Dasani, a transparent form of water, which for precautionary reasons has been made unavailable to consumers.

ENGINEERING
Donald J. Smith and his father, the late Frank J. Smith, of Orlando Florida, USA, for patenting the combover (U.S. Patent #4,022,227).

LITERATURE
The American Nudist Research Library of Kissimmee, Florida, USA, for preserving nudist history so that everyone can see it.

PSYCHOLOGY
Daniel Simons of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Christopher Chabris of Harvard University, for demonstrating that when people pay close attention to something, it's all too easy to overlook anything else -- even a woman in a gorilla suit.

ECONOMICS
The Vatican, for outsourcing prayers to India.

PEACE
Daisuke Inoue of Hyogo, Japan, for inventing karaoke, thereby providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other.

BIOLOGY
Ben Wilson of the University of British Columbia, Lawrence Dill of Simon Fraser University [Canada], Robert Batty of the Scottish Association for Marine Science, Magnus Whalberg of the University of Aarhus [Denmark], and Hakan Westerberg of Sweden's National Board of Fisheries, for showing that herrings apparently communicate by farting.

[N40GL]

By Marc Abrahams (edited for length)

Each year, ten Ig Nobel Prizes are awarded. The selection criterion is simple. The prizes are for "achievements that cannot or should not be reproduced." Examine that phrase carefully. It covers a lot of ground. It says nothing as to whether a thing is good or bad, commendable or pernicious.

For example: after something has been discovered or created, no one - anyone, anywhere, ever - can later become the first to have made that discovery or creation. The "firstness" cannot be repeated. Thus, Don Featherstone (Ig Nobel Art Prize, 1996), the creator of the plastic pink flamingo, clearly qualifies under the "cannot be repeated" clause.

I raise this matter of good or bad, because the world in general seems to enjoy classifying things as being either one or the other. The Ig Nobel Prizes aside, most prizes, in most places, for most purposes are clearly designed to sanctify the goodness or badness of the recipients. Olympic medals go to very good athletes. Worst-dressed prizes go to badly dressed celebrities. Nobel Prizes go to scientists, writers, and others who excel. Occasional mistakes and omissions happen, sure, but these prizes, and most others, are meant to honor the extremes of humanity - those whose achievements should be seen as very good or very bad.

The Ig Nobel Prize isn't like that. The Ig, as it is known, honors the great muddle in which most of us exist much of the time. Life is confusing. Good and bad get all mixed up. Yin can be hard to distinguish from yang. Ditto for data from artifact and, sometimes, up from down.

Most people go through life without ever being awarded a great, puffy prize to acknowledge that, yes, they have done something. That's why we award Ig Nobel Prizes. If you win one, it signifies to one and all that you have done some thing. What that thing is may be hard to explain - may even be totally inexplicable. Whether your achievement is for the public good or bad may be difficult or even painful to explain. But the fact is, you did it, and have been recognized for doing it. Let others make of that recognition what they will. If you've done something people chuckle at, and you win an Ig, then more people will hear about it. And maybe some of those people will also become curious, and will think about what you've accomplished, and fall in love with it.

Clearly, this has happened with Peter Fong's experiment in which he fed Prozac to clams (Ig Nobel Biology Prize, 1998), Robert Matthews's explication of whether buttered toast always falls on the buttered side (Ig Nobel Physics Prize, 1996), Harold Hillman's report on "The Possible Pain Experienced during Execution by Different Methods" (Ig Nobel Peace Prize, 1997), and Jerald Bain and Kerry Siminoski's examination of "The Relationship among Height, Penile Length, and Foot Size" (Ig Nobel Statistics Prize, 1998).

This raises one other matter that should mentioned. The Ig Nobel Board of Governors follows the same dictum that is said to inspire physicians: "First, do no harm."

There are in this world people who are quick to judge, condemn, and punish others. Some of these unhappy people are in positions of authority and might be inclined to, say, punish and ridicule someone in their lab who wins a goofy, meaningless prize. Because we know that such people exist, the Ig Nobel Board of Governors consults with scientists who are under strong consideration for an Ig, to ask whether winning might in any way cause them professional difficulties. In cases where there appears to be a genuine risk, the Prize is not awarded to that person, but goes instead to some other, equally worthy soul. To date, this has happened in about six cases.

Much more common is the case where an individual or a group pleads long and loud to receive an Ig. This has happened more times than we can count. So far, only one Prize has gone to such seekers (the prize to the aforementioned team of Barheim and Sandvik). But who can say what the future has in store?

Marc Abrahams is editor of the Annals of Improbable Research and chairman of the Ig Nobel Board of Governors.

[Patrick]

CHEMISTRY
The Coca-Cola Company of Great Britain, for using advanced technology to convert liquid from the River Thames into Dasani, a transparent form of water, which for precautionary reasons has been made unavailable to consumers.
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Thier going to luv that one at work!!!!!!!1