Yesterday, Thur Sept 17th, the annual IgNobel awards were announced.
The what?
It’s a satire of the Nobel prize (coming next month), but the research that gets an award is real research. Basically they go find the weirdest whackiest research paper and grant the researchers an award. Often they turn up in person to receive that award, but for rather obvious reasons it all happened online this year.
Fun IgNobel Facts
Before we get into the details of who won, and what exactly they did to win, here are a few fun IgNobel facts …
- Genuine Nobel Laureates physically hand out the prizes, and participate in the ceremony in other ways
- Andre Geim, who won an Ig Nobel Prize in 2000 for levitating a frog by magnetism, was awarded a Nobel Prize in physics in 2010 for his work with graphene.
- Nobel Prize-winning physicist Roy Glauber, known for his humbleness and sense of humor, would attend each and every year, and always helped sweep up afterward. He sadly passed away at the age of 93
- The winners receive money – a 10-trillion dollar bill from Zimbabwe, which is utterly worthless, but fun. ($100 trillion Zimbabwe dollars = 40 US cents).
The ten 2020 IgNobel Prize Winners
ACOUSTICS PRIZE [AUSTRIA, SWEDEN, JAPAN, USA, SWITZERLAND]
Stephan Reber, Takeshi Nishimura, Judith Janisch, Mark Robertson, and Tecumseh Fitch, for inducing a female Chinese alligator to bellow in an airtight chamber filled with helium-enriched air.
REFERENCE: “A Chinese Alligator in Heliox: Formant Frequencies in a Crocodilian,” Stephan A. Reber, Takeshi Nishimura, Judith Janisch, Mark Robertson, and W. Tecumseh Fitch, Journal of Experimental Biology, vol. 218, 2015, pp. 2442-2447.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Stephan Reber, Takeshi Nishimura, Judith Janisch, Mark Robertson, and Tecumseh Fitch
Insights: (via here) …
The intent was a not to make the poor alligator perform a popular party trick. The authors explained that this was a good way to see if the creatures demonstrated vocal-tract resonances (technically known as formant frequencies), which are used by mammals and birds as an indicator of body size. And indeed, the authors did conclude that there was evidence of vocal-tract resonances in their female alligator. Furthermore, “Because birds and crocodilians share a common ancestor with all dinosaurs, a better understanding of their vocal production systems may also provide insight into the communication of extinct Archosaurians,” the authors wrote in their 2015 paper.
PSYCHOLOGY PRIZE [CANADA, USA]
Miranda Giacomin and Nicholas Rule, for devising a method to identify narcissists by examining their eyebrows.
REFERENCE: “Eyebrows Cue Grandiose Narcissism,” Miranda Giacomin and Nicholas O. Rule, Journal of Personality, vol. 87, no. 2, 2019, pp. 373-385.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Miranda Giacomin and Nicholas Rule
PEACE PRIZE [INDIA, PAKISTAN]
The governments of India and Pakistan, for having their diplomats surreptitiously ring each other’s doorbells in the middle of the night, and then run away before anyone had a chance to answer the door.
REFERENCE: Numerous news reports.
Insights: (via here) …
Relations between India and Pakistan have long been tense, but things got particularly ugly in 2018, with more than 434 ceasefire violations at the border in Kashmir in just the first two months of the year. Further worsening relations, it seems the foreign ministries in both countries also engaged in targeted harassment of senior diplomats from their rival countries. That included cutting off power and water supplies, tailing diplomats in their vehicles, obscene phone calls, aggressive confrontations, and, indeed, ringing diplomats’ doorbells in the wee hours of the morning and then running away. I’m not sure what’s worse: that supposed professional government representatives behaved like petty schoolchildren or that one retired Indian diplomat told the Guardian that such harassment was “neither new nor unusual”—and not limited to India-Pakistan relations.
PHYSICS PRIZE [AUSTRALIA, UKRAINE, FRANCE, ITALY, GERMANY, UK, SOUTH AFRICA]
Ivan Maksymov and Andriy Pototsky, for determining, experimentally, what happens to the shape of a living earthworm when one vibrates the earthworm at high frequency.
REFERENCE: “Excitation of Faraday-like body waves in vibrated living earthworms,” Ivan S. Maksymov and Andriy Pototsky, bioRxiv 10.1101/868521, December 8, 2019.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Ivan Maksymov and Andriy Pototsky
ECONOMICS PRIZE [UK, POLAND, FRANCE, BRAZIL, CHILE, COLOMBIA, AUSTRALIA, ITALY, NORWAY, ITALY]
Christopher Watkins, Juan David Leongómez, Jeanne Bovet, Agnieszka Żelaźniewicz, Max Korbmacher, Marco Antônio Corrêa Varella, Ana Maria Fernandez, Danielle Wagstaff, and Samuela Bolgan, for trying to quantify the relationship between different countries’ national income inequality and the average amount of mouth-to-mouth kissing.
REFERENCE: “National Income Inequality Predicts Cultural Variation in Mouth to Mouth Kissing,” Christopher D. Watkins, Juan David Leongómez, Jeanne Bovet, Agnieszka Żelaźniewicz, Max Korbmacher, Marco Antônio Corrêa Varella, Ana Maria Fernandez, Danielle Wagstaff, and Samuela Bolgan, Scientific Reports, vol. 9, article no. 6698, 2019.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Christopher Watkins
MANAGEMENT PRIZE [CHINA]
(奚广安) Xi Guang-An, (莫天祥) Mo Tian-Xiang, (杨康生) Yang Kang-Sheng, (杨广生) Yang Guang-Sheng, and (凌显四) Ling Xian Si, five professional hitmen in Guangxi, China, who managed a contract for a hit job (a murder performed for money) in the following way: After accepting payment to perform the murder, Xi Guang-An then instead subcontracted the task to Mo Tian-Xiang, who then instead subcontracted the task to Yang Kang-Sheng, who then instead subcontracted the task to Yang Guang-Sheng, who then instead subcontracted the task to Ling Xian-Si, with each subsequently enlisted hitman receiving a smaller percentage of the fee, and nobody actually performing a murder.
REFERENCE: Numerous news reports.
ENTOMOLOGY PRIZE [USA]
Richard Vetter, for collecting evidence that many entomologists (scientists who study insects) are afraid of spiders, which are not insects.
REFERENCE: “Arachnophobic Entomologists: When Two More Legs Makes a Big Difference,” Richard S. Vetter, American Entomologist, vol. 59, no. 3, 2013, pp. 168-175.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Richard Vetter
MEDICINE PRIZE [THE NETHERLANDS, BELGIUM]
Nienke Vulink, Damiaan Denys, and Arnoud van Loon, for diagnosing a long-unrecognized medical condition: Misophonia, the distress at hearing other people make chewing sounds.
REFERENCE: “Misophonia: Diagnostic Criteria for a New Psychiatric Disorder,” Arjan Schroder, Nienke Vulink, and Damiaan Denys, PLoS ONE, vol. 8, no. 1, 2013, e54706.
REFERENCE: “Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is Effective in Misophonia: An Open Trial,” Arjan E., Schröder, Nienke C. Vulink, Arnoud J. van Loon, and Damiaan A. Denys, Journal of Affective Disorders, vol. 217, 2017, pp. 289-294.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Nienke Vulink, Damiaan Denys, and Arnoud van Loon
MEDICAL EDUCATION PRIZE [BRAZIL, UK, INDIA, MEXICO, BELARUS, USA, TURKEY, RUSSIA, TURKMENISTAN]
Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, Boris Johnson of the United Kingdom, Narendra Modi of India, Andrés Manuel López Obrador of Mexico, Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, Donald Trump of the USA, Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, Vladimir Putin of Russia, and Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow of Turkmenistan, for using the Covid-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can.
REFERENCE: Numerous news reports.
NOTE: This is the second Ig Nobel Prize awarded to Alexander Lukashenko. In the year 2013, the Ig Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to Alexander Lukashenko, for making it illegal to applaud in public, AND to the Belarus State Police, for arresting a one-armed man for applauding.
MATERIALS SCIENCE PRIZE [USA, UK]
Metin Eren, Michelle Bebber, James Norris, Alyssa Perrone, Ashley Rutkoski, Michael Wilson, and Mary Ann Raghanti, for showing that knives manufactured from frozen human feces do not work well.
REFERENCE: “Experimental Replication Shows Knives Manufactured from Frozen Human Feces Do Not Work,” Metin I. Eren, Michelle R. Bebber, James D. Norris, Alyssa Perrone, Ashley Rutkoski, Michael Wilson, and Mary Ann Raghanti, Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, vol. 27, no. 102002, October 2019.
WHO PARTICIPATED IN THE CEREMONY: Metin Eren, Michelle Bebber, James Norris, Alyssa Perrone, Ashley Rutkoski, Michael Wilson, and Mary Ann Raghanti
The 30th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony
Here is the online awards Ceremony.
- More information about the ceremony: https://www.improbable.com/ig-about/t…
- More information about Improbable Research: https://www.improbable.com/