Improbable Research

The PubSci blog reports:

On Tuesday 2nd August Upstairs at the Brixton Ritzy [in London, UK] we’re going to give you a glimpse into the seedier side of sex in nature, with PubSci founder James Robson providing an entertaining talk on the subject.

Then we plan to open the floor to discussion about the role of observation in science, using an Ig Nobel-winning paper (pdf) on homosexual necrophilia in Mallards to get the conversation started.

“Imagine you could draw musical instruments on normal paper with any pencil (cheap circuit thumb-tacked on) and then play them with your finger,” say Jay Silver and Eric Rosenbaum at the MIT Media Lab. Drawdio (“draw audio”) is a cheap tool that lets you “play” any pencil drawing (no matter where you’ve drawn it) as you would play a theremin. Here’s cutesy video:

[HT @RichardWiseman]

BONUS: A now-more conventional form of theramin. This video shows Mr. Theremin, who invented the instrument that shares his name, playing his invention:

BONUS: One nifty gee-whiz aspect you can tout: a pencil drawing is essentially a few layers of the now-storied substance called graphene—the 2-dimensional form of carbon. Some pencil scratchings and some scotch tape (not to mention a magnet and a levitated frog) elevated Andre Geim to fame not so long ago.

BONUS: Investigator (and LFHCfS member) Richard Rae alerts us to this video of a Japanese toy that uses much the same principles:

The fantastically imaginative group called “Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine” — they once even tried to hijack the Ig Nobel Prizes! (see below) — has come up with another doozy. The Tehran Times reports, via something called ChristianPost, on a press release issued by the group:

Eating hot dogs as risky as smoking cigarettes?

Hot dogs are an American favorite and served in about 95 percent of the homes across the nation. Americans ate more than 16 billion hot dogs last year alone, according to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council…. However, health officials say eating processed meat is a really bad idea because it can cause colon cancer. That’s the message leaders at the Cancer Project of the group Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) want to get out.

In 1995 this same “Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine” issued a press release in which they claimed to be awarding Ig Nobel Prizes to people they disliked.

We, the organizers of the actual Ig Nobel Prizes, then issued a press release in response:

Washington Lobbyists Try to Interlope on Ig Nobel

(CAMBRIDGE, MA), January 9, 1995.  These days nothing is sacred to Washington lobbyists — not even the Ig Nobel Prize. A lobby group has tried to appropriate the good name of the Ig Nobel Prizes. The genuine prizes are awarded
each fall by “The Annals of Improbable Research” (which has been described as “The MAD Magazine of science”) and The MIT Museum. They honor individuals whose achievements “cannot or should not be reproduced.” Last week an animal rights lobby group calling itself ”Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine” issued a press release in which it tried to announce its own list of Ig Nobel Prizewinners. The international science community is shocked.

“I am shocked,” said Harvard Professor William Lipscomb, a 1976 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry.

“I am shocked,” said Harvard Professor Sheldon Glashow, a 1990 Nobel Laureate in Physics.

“It’s outrageous. My hair stands on end at the very thought of it,” said New England Biolabs research director Richard Roberts, a 1993 Nobel Laureate in
Physiology or Medicine.

“How useless is a chocolate teapot?” ask The Naked Scientists, who then answer the question to their own — and perhaps also to your — satisfaction, documenting it with photos and a video. (Thanks to investigator David Kessler for bringing this to our attention.)

The father of nude psychotherapy could boast about his suit. His lawsuit, that is. Case Briefs explains, tersely:

Bindrim v. Mitchell

Citation. 444 U.S. 984 100 S. Ct. 490 62 L. Ed. 2d 412 1979 U.S.

Brief Fact Summary. The Defendants were Gwen Mitchell (Ms. Mitchell) and Doubleday Publishing (Defendants). Ms. Mitchell wrote a novel allegedly based on the Plaintiff, Dr. Paul Bindrim’s (Plaintiff), psychological techniques, including a nude marathon. Plaintiff brought an action for libel. Defendants claimed the novel was a work of fiction and the character could not reasonably be identified as Plaintiff.