Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers and friends
Have you heard of the Nobel Prize? No, not the real Nobel awards presented every year in Sweden and Norway (for the Peace prize), but the Ig Nobel prize, awarded every year since 1991, initially at MIT then at Harvard University’s Sanders Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, since 1994. As the link to Wikipedia below describes, it is a satiric pun (emanating from the word Ignoble – meaning not noble) to "honor achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think." The prize is presented by actual Nobel laureates (real ones) to 10 unusual or trivial achievements in science. If you want to know more about the event, click on the link below, but since I feel humorous today, I want to discuss some of the winners from this year, which I read about the other day.
Before going into the details, you should know that the 10 award categories are not strictly organized and identical every year. There are recurring/permanent categories, such as Medicine, Physics, Peace, Chemistry, Economics, Biology but then there are other ones that pop up every so often, such as Transportation, Entomology. Now for some of our 2021 winners.
As a male who from time to time grows a beard (and a mustache) out of boredom or laziness, I was particularly attracted to the Peace prize awarded to “Ethan Beseris, Steven Naleway, and David Carrier, for testing the hypothesis that humans evolved beards to protect themselves from punches to the face.” One of the winners on the team, also surmised that deep facial hair could also make it difficult for the assailant to properly target the jaw. Nevertheless, he admitted that a good punch will always do harm to a face regardless of the facial hair. Personally, though, I believe facial hair growth is a natural consequence of biology (male hair growth) and lack of early instruments for shaving. Why else would every rendition of old historical figures has them carry a beard and a mustache?
Among other winners (in the ecology category) are “Leila Satari, Alba Guillén, Àngela Vidal-Verdú, and Manuel Porcar, for using genetic analysis to identify the different species of bacteria that reside in wads of discarded chewing gum stuck on pavements in various countries.”, which I guess did not study the ones from Singapore, given the heavy fines that exist in the country for throwing chewing gum on the ground. I also noticed the Transportation prize awarded to “Robin Radcliffe, Mark Jago, Peter Morkel, Estelle Morkel, Pierre du Preez, Piet Beytell, Birgit Kotting, Bakker Manuel, Jan Hendrik du Preez, Michele Miller, Julia Felippe, Stephen Parry, and Robin Gleed, for determining by experiment whether it is safer to transport an airborne rhinoceros upside-down”.
My favorite, however, was in the category of Medicine to “Olcay Cem Bulut, Dare Oladokun, Burkard Lippert, and Ralph Hohenberger, for demonstrating that sexual orgasms can be as effective as decongestant medicines at improving nasal breathing.” Wow, imagine with this evidence, you can see through fake orgasms, if the nose stays clogged after sex, or there is now a scientific argument to convince your partner for the night (“honey my nose is clogged and doctor advised not to take decongestant”). I wonder how many people tried to get themselves (along with their partners) signed up in the study group, and then went ahead and self-induced cold and congested nose? I can imagine the guy who is jumping up and down and announcing to everyone that tonight is the night, he has a cold, and his nose is clogged!!!
Info on IgNobel prize
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize
Paris, November 25, 2021
Zeejay