2006 Ig Nobel Prizes Awarded

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Posted by ryuzaki0 on Thursday October 5, 2006 @04:58PM from the best-of-the-worst dept.

davidwr writes "The Ig-Nobel Peace Prize went to Howard Stapleton for his groundbreaking research in teenager-repellent technology. D. Lynn Halpern won an award for research into why fingernails on a chalkboard are almost as annoying as teenagers. Ivan Schwab garnered his award for research into avian headacheology. Two french researchers cooked up a medal for spaghetti research. Read more about these and other prizes here and at the Improbable Research official web site. To those Slashdotters who were expecting an award, better luck next year."

26 of 167 comments (clear)

Aww... by Jello+B. · 2006-10-05 17:02 · Score: 5, Funny

I thought my death clock would win this time... Maybe if I make a Smelloscope...
bird eyes? by circletimessquare · 2006-10-05 17:13 · Score: 4, Informative

His research, published in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, followed studies of head injuries in woodpeckers from the 1970s. The answer lies in how a woodpecker's skull and brain are arranged: the muscles around the sensitive brain tissues make the woodpecker's head function like a perfect shock absorber.

shouldn't that be Ornithology?

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1. Re:bird eyes? by Skidge · 2006-10-05 17:23 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Maybe he started out researching injuries due to woodpeckers pecking out human eyes and one thing lead to another....
2. Re:bird eyes? by ian_mackereth · 2006-10-05 17:44 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Only eventually... he started out by wondering why woodpeckers' eyes don't pop out. (The nictating membrane tightens just before impact, if you're interested...)
time to use my mod points! by arun_s · 2006-10-05 17:17 · Score: 3, Funny

electronic teenager repellant: -1, Troll
work on the mystery of why fingernails being dragged down a blackboard produces an excruciating sound: -1, Stupid
how woodpeckers avoid headaches: +1, Interesting
why dry spaghetti breaks into more than one piece when it is bent: -1, Lame

--
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1. Re:time to use my mod points! by anagama · 2006-10-05 17:34 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  electronic teenager repellant: -1, Troll
  
  Unfair mod. Should be +5 fucking brilliant.
  Now, if we can just herf all those thumpmobiles ....
  
  --
  What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
2. Re:time to use my mod points! by grammar+fascist · 2006-10-05 17:40 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  electronic teenager repellant: -1, Troll
  
  Give it five years, and you'll be wondering how you can possibly get along without one.
  
  --
  I got my Linux laptop at System76.
3. Re:time to use my mod points! by gardyloo · 2006-10-05 17:44 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  why dry spaghetti breaks into more than one piece when it is bent: -1, Lame
  
  Apparently someone doesn't know how interesting this problem is. Feynman spent a lot of time on it. It's much, much harder than, say, showing that a tall, skinny brick structure will break 1/3 of the way up from the ground if it's slowly tipped to one side (or if a demolition charge makes it crumble). Though that research certainly isn't Nobel-winning stuff, it's a remarkably difficult problem with a lot of applications (including, methinks, applications to space-station engineering and probably nanostructures).
4. Re:time to use my mod points! by arun_s · 2006-10-05 18:00 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Apparently someone doesn't know how interesting this problem is.
  Very interesting indeed, it appears I have been too hasty.
  
  --
  I can explain it for you, but I can't understand it for you.
5. Re:time to use my mod points! by brown-eyed+slug · 2006-10-05 20:06 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  electronic teenager repellant: -1, Troll
  
  No, it really works! I've seen no electronic teenagers round here...
  
  Sorry.
6. Re:time to use my mod points! by maxwell+demon · 2006-10-05 21:49 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  why dry spaghetti breaks into more than one piece when it is bent: -1, Lame
  
  You seem to miss the significance of that research. Note that the article mentioned the physics Nobel price for big bang research. This spaghetti research is of course very related to the question of how the universe was created. After all, we know it was created by the FSM, and surely bending and breaking spaghetti was an integral part of the act of creation.
  
  --
  The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
7. Re:time to use my mod points! by theonetruekeebler · 2006-10-06 00:13 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  it's a remarkably difficult problem with a lot of applications (including, methinks, applications to space-station engineering
  Due respect, gard, but I'm not worried about whether my space station breaks into two pieces or three and I'm not going to spend much spare time trying to snap space stations in half. Any event such that my station is in N > 1 pieces has produced N - 1 too many pieces.
  
  --
  This is not my sandwich.
No mention for Digital Rectal Massage? by atomicstrawberry · 2006-10-05 17:44 · Score: 5, Funny

The winner of the medicine prize got it for ground breaking research into curing intractible hiccups by sticking his finger up a patient's anus.

He also suggests that sex is the most potent cure for hiccups, but that won't really affect anyone on slashdot.
1. Re:No mention for Digital Rectal Massage? by Dorceon · 2006-10-05 18:06 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Now that's the kind of DRM we can all enjoy!
  
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  What sound do people on rollercoasters make? Hint: it's not Xbox 360.
2. Re:No mention for Digital Rectal Massage? by Secrity · 2006-10-06 00:16 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  Try http://public.diversity.org.uk/deviant/fsfist.htm
Another teenager repellant by ringmaster_j · 2006-10-05 18:20 · Score: 5, Insightful

At Bathurst subway/streetcar/bus station in Toronto, they play classical (well, baroque actually) music on the PA to keep teenagers away. It seems to work quite well, actually. It's only at that station, and since classical music is only annoying to teens (at least to the point of forcing them from the building) it doesn't trouble other patrons. One caveat: if you (like me) are one of those Classical Punks- who follow their own rules, and wear all the lead-based makeup and penny loafers they want- it doesn't work.
1. Re:Another teenager repellant by JamesD_UK · 2006-10-05 20:32 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  They have one of those teenaged repellent devices at my local shop. It's been several years since I was a teenager and I can hear the noise perfectly well. It's not enough to stop me going into the shop if I really wanted to but it's sufficiently annoying that I now spend my money elsewhere. It doesn't really appear to have had too much effect on the teenagers who hang around on the street either - they don't have anywhere else to go.
The answer: ageism by Valacosa · 2006-10-05 18:26 · Score: 4, Insightful

Why is it something that could be offensive (like sex and violence in movies) is generally regarded as bad, whereas something designed solely to be offensive (The Mosquito) is regarded as a good thing?

Mr Stapleton deserves the Ig Nobel.

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1. Re:The answer: ageism by kfg · 2006-10-05 22:51 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Being in the security industry I learned of this device some time ago (early this year). . .
  
  I first experienced it more than 40 years ago; so I'm not sure why it's news now. Drove me fucking nuts. Store that used it is now bankrupt and a parking lot.
  
  KFG
PC? by Anonymous Coward · 2006-10-05 19:29 · Score: 4, Funny

chalkboard
Is this a politicly correct blackboard or something?
Limburg Cheese experiment by morie · 2006-10-05 20:00 · Score: 3, Interesting

A Dutch group won the IgNobel for their work on malaria mosquitos and limburg cheese. In a more serious experiment, they found the smell of feet is one of the main attractions to malaria mosquitos. They then tried Limburg Cheese because it smells, well, like feet.

They are one of the leading institutes in mosquito research in the world.

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Getting replies like these... by davidwr · 2006-10-05 20:04 · Score: 3, Funny

+5 priceless

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Re:Peace Prize? by myowntrueself · 2006-10-05 20:10 · Score: 5, Interesting

What's next, Peace Prize for the nuclear bomb? They certainly bring peace...

There was this guy named Bertrand Russell.

At the end of World War 2 when the 'allies' had the nuke and the Soviets didn't, he advocated a pre-emptive nuclear strike against the Soviet Union.

As soon as the Soviets developed their own nukes, he became an anti-nuclear peace activist.

For him, it was all down to game theory.

So yeah in a sense nukes may brought peace -- if the Soviets hadn't developed them, Eastern Europe and Russia would quite possibly have been nuked into submission. I think that would have been less 'peaceful' than the cold war.

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Links to stories botched and slashdotted by davidwr · 2006-10-05 20:16 · Score: 3, Informative

I don't know what happened to the news-story link, I know it was there when I submitted it. Anyhow, Google News has many more stories to choose from.

The Improbable Results site I linked is very slow due to media attention. I'm sure Slashdot didn't help :).

Here's a Coral Cache version of the Improbable Results website and the list of present and past winners.

If Coral doesn't work, here's a MirrorDot version of the Improbable Results main page.

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They always said the anal by The+Creator · 2006-10-05 23:08 · Score: 4, Funny

-ouge hole whas the answer to DRM.

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The Quickest Way to Clear Out the Mall: by aquatone282 · 2006-10-06 00:23 · Score: 4, Funny

Send in a pair of Army recruiters.

Works like a champ.

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