2007 Ig Nobel Awards « Madhuri’s Thoughts

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2007 Ig Nobel Awards

October 5, 2007 by madhurisinha

The 2007 Ig Nobel awards have been announced. The awards which are supposedly lighter versions of the more serious ‘Nobel Prize’ are awarded by committees consisting of an actual Nobel Prize winner (yes from the serious one) in a function conducted at Sander’s Theater at Harvard University (yes the Boston one).

The research topics of the winners are not only utterly amusing but also thought provoking (ahem..). Like this year’s prize in Aviation went for discovering how hamsters recover faster from jet lag when on Viagra (http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0703388104v1 and http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070521/full/news070521-1.html). Move over melatonin, the little blue pill is here.

Similarly, Side effects of swallowing swords was the winning entry in Medicine and you wont be surprised that mild side effects are sore throat and grave ones often result in perforation of pharynx (ouch). The article has been published in the respected Bristish Medical Journal or BMJ (http://www.bmj.com/cgi/reprint/333/7582/1285).

The Peace prize went for research and development of a “Gay Bomb,” which would cause enemy troops to become sexually attractive to each other (hmm. if only we could have such bombs to end all violence in the world).

The Linguistics prize proved that rats sometimes cannot distinguish between Japanese played backward and Dutch played backward (what??? They can distinguish these languages played forward? And sometimes played backward too? issh I feel so ignorant).

Similarly prizes are awarded in the fields of Biology (for taking a census of all the mites and other life forms that live in people’s beds),

Chemistry (extracting vanilla flavor from cow dung),

Economics (patenting a device for catching bank robbers by ensnaring them in a net),

Literature (study of the word ‘the’),

Nutrition (for investigating people’s appetites by secretly feeding them a self-refilling bowl of soup), and

Physics (for a theoretical study of how sheets become wrinkled).

Since the hypotheses were substantiated experimentally and published in good science journals, one cannot really deny them the seriousness they deserve. I am just amazed at the originality and magnificence of the human mind.

Posted in science | 14 Comments

14 Responses to “2007 Ig Nobel Awards”

on October 5, 2007 at 1:151 Mahendra

Hi Madhuri,

I discovered you through your comments on Nita’s blog.

Very nice of you to write about the igNoble awards! I haven’t seen anyone blogging about them…

One suggestion: You can make your posts more readable by breaking them into paragraphs, and get more comments by getting rid of the comment moderation. It’s a pain. Further, why not switch to WordPress? It’s much, much, better!

Keep blogging!
on October 6, 2007 at 1:152 Nita

Hi Madhuri!
You have a nice blog going.
This post about the ignoble awards is interesting… and the one about the swords very funny!!
Mahendra’s given some good tips. actually in wordpress we can easily surf other posts easily and click on them, all from one’s own blog. One can check responses to one’s comments from our own blogs! Its a great feature…but I guess blogger too has its good points. I was on blogger once. Just for one month until one of my readers faizal told me about wordpress. luckily as i was on blogger for a very short time and therefore had not got attached to it! In fact I had some issues, which I think they have sorted out now.
Keep going, whether on blogger or wordpress!
on October 6, 2007 at 1:153 Rambodoc

You have one more eager reader waiting for you in WordPress. Cool blog, this one!
on October 8, 2007 at 1:154 Shefaly Yogendra

Sorry folks, but should that not be spelt Ig NobEL all the way instead of Ig NobLE?
on October 8, 2007 at 1:155 Madhuri Sinha

Thanks Mahendra. Have got rid of moderation, and will break down posts into paragraphs too. Thanks a lot for tips. Will look into wordpress.

Thanks a lot Nita for the encouragement. I will look into wordpress.

Thanks Rambodoc. Now i will have to make the transition and soon.

OOPSSorry everyone.Thanks Shefaly for pointing out. Mistake rectified.
on October 9, 2007 at 1:156 pr3rna

One more person waiting for you in wordpress!!!!!!!!!
Nice post.
on October 9, 2007 at 1:157 mahendrap

Hey, that was a fast switch! I’m happy and grateful
on October 9, 2007 at 1:158 madhurisinha

Thanks Prerna and Mahendra
on October 9, 2007 at 1:159 Nita

Hi there. Just wanted to say hi.
on October 9, 2007 at 1:1510 rambodoc

Great to see you, Madhuri!
on October 9, 2007 at 1:1511 madhurisinha

Thanks Nita and Rambodoc
on October 10, 2007 at 1:1512 Denny Smithix

I have to say, whoever got those Nobel Prizes must be genuises! I give them a warm round of applase, that’s amazing!

My feelings exactly. These are original research work. You have a great site Denny. I am an avid space watcher too.
on October 10, 2007 at 1:1513 Kitty

WOW! Nobel Prizes, that’s serious stuff to receive! Congrats to the smart scientists!

Yes the researchers are smart indeed.
on October 10, 2007 at 1:1514 madhurisinha

Shefaly,
I have emailed you.
Thanks