Marc Abrahams's Blog, page 17

Names influence faces? Whack-a-mammoth. Stochastic accuracy. Ghostly confession.

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Face: the future — Should you take at face value a science paper that suggests that your face is the result of a “self-fulfilling prophecy process”? … Did Natalie always look like a Natalie? Or did […]

“And as usual, they were wrong.”

“As with many areas of science, humans went into it assuming that they pretty much knew what they were going to discover, and that refining their instruments would just make their existing simplistic picture clearer. And as usual, they were wrong.” —Helen Czerski, on page 241 her book The Blue Machine (W.W. Norton, publishers, 2023) […]

Science of love, tolerating stinks, Slicing the self, Unusual sacrifices, Simple pleasures

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has five segments. Here are bits of each of them: Science of love — “Losing and ending a romantic relationship is one of the most painful losses adults experience,” begins a BAS (bountifully acronymed study) by researchers in Germany and Iran, published in the Journal of […]

Is ChatGPT Bullshit?

Hicks, Humphries and Slater express an opinion: “ChatGPT is Bullshit,” Michael Townsen Hicks, James Humphries, and Joe Slater, Ethics and Information Technology, vol. 26, no. 38, 2024.

Dramatic Improbable Readings at WorldCon in Glasgow

WorldCon in Glasgow, Scotland will include a special session of Dramatic Improbable Readings, (read aloud by probably dramatic readers) of very brief extracts from improbably exciting genuine published research studies, some of which have been honored with Ig Nobel Prizes. The readers include: Asher Rose Fox, Geri Sullivan (who is also moderator), Mason Porter, Oriana […]

The audience at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony…

At the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony (and at the related event, Ig Nobel Face-to-Face, two days later), the audience is part of the show. Some people come from distant towns, states, countries and continents. Every year Briget and Chris Hart journey from Florida to Massachusetts to be in the audience at the Ig. This year […]

Ig Nobel Prize 2024 Ceremony TICKETS

TICKETS to attend the 34th First annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony in person GO ON SALE FRIDAY, AUGUST 2, 2024, at noon US eastern time. Tickets are sold exclusively at https://www.tickettailor.com/events/i... Seating is limited. The lecture hall (MIT building 10, room 250) has only about 400 seats, many of which will be occupied by ceremony participants. […]

Diet of worms? Numberful height requirements

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Diet of worms? — The phrase “diet of worms” intrigues people (if it intrigues them at all) in various ways. For historians, it can trigger arguments about a political convocation that happened in the city of […]

Can 12 Large Clowns Fit in a Mini Cooper?

Reason this out. Or do the experiment. Or read what Renée Baillargeon has to say about these two questions: “Can 12 Large Clowns Fit in a Mini Cooper? Or When Are Beliefs and Reasoning Explicit and Conscious?” Renée Baillargeon, Developmental Science, vol. 7, no. 4, 2004, pp. 422-424.

The Frog Kamasutra

De Kikker Kamasutra “The Frog Kamasutra” is a new book [in Dutch] of delights — about biological surprises — written by Ig Nobel Biology Prize winner Kees Moeliker.  The ISBN is 9789044656855. Moeliker was awarded the 2003 Nobel Biology Prize, for documenting the first scientifically recorded case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck. That […]