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2004 Ig Nobel Prizes Announced

Posted by michael on from the she-blinded-me-with-science dept.

ancice writes "The 2004 Ig Nobel prizes are out. Article by New Scientist. An 'invisible gorilla has scooped the 2004 Ig Nobel Prize for Psychology'. And 'dropped food is safe to eat if it has spent no more than five seconds on the floor' - Public Health. Finally, there's proof for the 5 second rule! And for Engineering, 'Patenting of the combover'. Official page with ceremony and lectures."

1 of 204 comments (clear)

  1. Winner by Tomahawk · · Score: 5, Interesting

    On Brainiac (on Sky ONE in the UK) last week, they did a demonstration of the 'Invisible Gorilla' expirement, which one.

    Basically, they had about 7 or 8 poeple on the screen, and told us to watch how many times a particular parcel was passed around.

    The answer was 12 (for anyone who wanted to know).

    During this time, someone dress in a bee suit walked onto the screen, stood there for about 10 seconds, and walked off the far side. The parcel even passed across this person.

    I didn't see the bee at all, until it was played back. The bee was on the screen for a full 20 seconds in total.

    It was quite amazing. Almost as good as trying to get your right foot to rotate clockwise, and your right hand to rotate anti-clockwise...

    T.