Date:   Mon Oct 18 1993  15:02:00
From:   Sheppard Gordon
To:     All
Subj:   Ig Nobel - A

CELEBRATING THE IG NOBELEST OF THEM ALL
The Scientific Method: There's Madness in It
10/11/93
Newsday

HE COULD MAKE a radio out of a coconut, but the Professor from
Gilligan's Island could never figure out how to get home to pick up
the Nobel Prize he was destined to win. Still, he's more famous than
most Nobel Prize winners. Proof of that came one night last week
when Russell Johnson, the actor who played the Professor, shared a
stage at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with two actual
Nobel laureates, along with a bunch of live chickens and someone who
looked a lot like Albert Einstein.
There's a dirty little secret among scientists  -  some of them
have a sense of humor. It all spills out at MIT once a year as some
of America's scientific elite, and some goofballs, take part in the
Ig Nobel Prizes, timed to coincide with the announcements of those
other awards for science, literature and peace. In a tradition
dating all the way back to 1991, the Igs, a production of MIT and a
science humor publication called The Journal of Irreproducible
Results, are awarded to individuals "whose achievements cannot or
should not be reproduced." Previous winners have included Michael
Milken for economics and sperm bank patriarch Dr. Cecil Jacobson for
biology.
Before the start of this year's "Third First Annual Ig Nobel
Ceremony," a loudspeaker announcement begged, "Ridiculing science is
reprehensible. Please will you all go home." Obviously relishing an
evening of politically incorrect silliness, the audience of some
1,200 scientists and MIT students, many wearing white lab coats or
Halloween costumes, stayed put. They were soon rewarded with the
opening procession of "Dignitaries and Ignitaries," including honored
delegations such as the Non-Extremists for Moderate Change from
Finland and the Intergalactic House of Fruitcakes.
Onstage was a group of "Authority Figures," including Albert
Einstein (played by Alan Lightman, author of the best-seller
"Einstein's Dreams," in a fright wig) and two actual Nobel Prize
winners from Harvard, William Lipscomb (chemistry, 1976) and Sheldon
Glashow (physics, 1979), who, rumor had it, was warned by his wife
not to do this again. Three other Nobel laureates sent taped
remarks.
The crowd greeted the real Nobelists warmly, but went berserk at
the introduction of Johnson, now holding the title Professor
Emeritus, Gilligan's Island. Johnson, who looks more like the
Skipper now, stood smiling during a long, partly standing ovation.
Some audience members cried, "We love you."
Following the ceremonial tossing out of the first Harvard joke
(not worth repeating), and the dash onto the stage of a groupie who
had won the first Win-a-Date-With-a-Nobel-Laureate contest and hugged
the stately Lipscomb, the presentations began.

The Ig Nobel Prize in Psychology went to Harvard's John Mack and
Temple's David Jacobs for their actual conclusion that "people who
believe they were kidnaped by aliens from outer space probably
were." Accepting on their behalf, Kevin Steiling, who in real life
is an assistant attorney general of Massachusetts, reminded the
audience that "kidnaping is a federal offense."

The Ig Nobel Peace Prize went to Pepsi of the Phillipines, for
announcing the wrong winning number in a contest, "thereby inciting
and uniting eight-hundred thousand riotously expectant winners and
bringing many warring factions together for the first time in their
nation's history."
The prize for literature was awarded to the 976 co-authors of a
medical research paper in last month's issue of the New England
Journal of Medicine entitled, "An International Randomized Trial
Comparing Four Thrombolytic Strategies for Acute Myocardial
Infarction." It was accepted by Dr. Marcia Angell, executive editor
of the prestigious journal.
An Ig in Consumer Engineering went to Ron Popeil, inventor of the
Veg-O-Matic, the Pocket Fisherman and the Inside-the-Shell Egg
Scrambler. An alleged consumer of every Popeil product was escorted
off the stage after pointing at Nobelists Glashow and Lipscomb and
screaming, "I have an inside the egg egg scrambler! You see these
guys? They don't know how that works! They have no idea!"
The awards were interrupted periodically for Heisenberg Certainty
Lectures (named for the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, one of the
foundations of 20th Century physics). The certainty was that each
lecture, delivered by the Authority Figures on subjects of their
choice, would not last more than 30 seconds  -  strictly enforced by
a soccer-style referee with whistle.
In his half-minute lecture, MIT economist Paul Krugman informed
the audience that Ross Perot is wrong: "That great sucking sound
isn't coming from Mexico. It's coming from outer space. Space
aliens are stealing American jobs." Russell Johnson used his 30
seconds to end a 25-year-old mystery: The Professor was able to make
radios from coconuts but not get the castaways off the island because
he had been educated at MIT.
Eleven Igs were presented in all. Jay Schiffman, inventor of
Autovision, a projection device that makes it possible to drive and
watch TV at the same time, sent a note refusing his Visionary
Technology award. Protesting the award were members of MADWWT  -
Mothers Against Driving While Watching Television. The Chemistry Ig
went to the folks who created the method for putting perfumes in
magazine ads. Robert Faid won the Mathematics Ig for his computation
of the exact odds (more than 8.6 trillion to 1), that Mikhail
Gorbachev is the antichrist  -  the Ig committee itself announced the
odds for computer tycoon Bill Gates at a takeable 8 to 5.
The evening's final winners, Drs. James F. Nolan, Thomas J.
Stillwell and John P. Sands, Jr., wrote a paper for The Journal of
Emergency Medicine entitled "Acute Management of the Zipper-Entrapped
Penis." Nolan, who actually showed up from Pennsylvania, remarked,
"I was here to save my generation from penile injury." The ceremony
concluded with a group of  Nolan's supposed patients, most wearing
sweatpants, singing about their travails to the tune of "We Are the
World."
At a post-Ig reception, Johnson stuck up for those who aren't
real scientists but play one on TV. Nobel laureates may be more
important, he said, "but we still have our place." Nobel winner
Lipscomb said, "Science should be fun." and Marc Abrahams, the
editor of the Journal of Irreproducible Results and Ig master of
ceremonies, summed up the evening: "It went very quickly. No one
died, there were very few injuries and we had no kidnapings. We were
very pleased. Why are you badgering me this way?"

Art: AP Photo - Russell Johnson, the Professor of `Gilligan's Island^
breaks up on being served a tray of Spam at the Ig Nobel festivities

====================================================================

Date:   Mon Oct 18 1993  15:02:00
From:   Sheppard Gordon
To:     All
Subj:   Ig Nobel - B


Misappliance of science - the ignoble prizes AWARDS Dotty antics in
Boston may prove that some scientists really are mad
10/17/93
THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

AS THE Nobel Prize winners were solemnly named last week, a much
less reverent ceremony of a similar kind was taking place in Boston.
These were the Ig Nobel prize givings, originating from Alfred
Nobel's fictitious brother Ig, and awarded annually by the Journal
of Irreproducible Results, a sort of scientific equivalent of
Private Eye, which gives awards "for achievements which cannot -
and should not - be reproduced".
Since the validity of a scientific experiment depends on whether
it can be repeated, and an experiment which cannot be is worthless,
this gives some idea of the science that is being honoured by the
followers of Ig Nobel.
Some of it is intended as a spoof, while some (occasionally) is
bizarre but true. "You have to read them and make up your own
mind," says the journal's editor, Dr Mark Abrahams, a computer
scientist.
The most amusing prizes are those awarded to solemn people who
talk nonsense. This year's Mathematics Prize went to an expert on
"Biblical numerics" who has "proved" that Mikhail Gorbachev is the
Antichrist.
"I am absolutely serious about this," says retired nuclear
engineer Dr Robert Faid, of Greenville, South Carolina, "and I am
surprised that people would make a joke of it. I have shown from
the history of the 'kings' (general secretaries) in the Soviet
Union and from the Book of Revelations that there is an
860,609,175,188, 282,100 to 1 chance that Gorbachev is the
Antichrist who will return to power by overthrowing Yeltsin and who
will then overwhelm the West by violence."
Dr Faid's prediction is based mainly on highly complicated
arithmetic involving the spelling of Gorbachev's name in several
languages and combinations of the Number of the Beast, 666, with
its opposite 888, the Number of Jesus. Few ordinary people will be
able to follow it, but Dr Faid, who has a considerable following,
is convinced of his case.
The Ig Nobel Prize for Literature was equally diverting. The
articles in most serious scientific journals are usually signed by
two, three, or perhaps half a dozen people. A double-digit number
of authors is rare. But on September 2 this year the New England
Journal of Medicine published an article on heart disease that was
signed by no fewer than 972 authors. An editor of this journal was
persuaded to come to the Ig Nobel ceremony and admit that each of
these authors was responsible, statistically, for exactly two words.

A book of vast pomposity by two university professors  - John Mack
of Harvard Medical School and David Jacobs of Temple University -
won the Prize for Psychology. It claimed that "millions" of people were
being kidnapped by aliens from outer space.
"Their reasoning is most ingenious," said Dr Abrahams. "As I
understand it, they claim that people are being snatched from their
beds, taken through solid walls and smuggled aboard UFO ships. The
entire kidnapping process is therefore invisible. Since it is
invisible it cannot be disproved. And since it cannot be disproved
it must be true."

The highlight of the ceremony, which is regarded as a general
excuse for serious scientists to let off steam, was the birth of a
new liberation movement. But it was not humans or even animals the
audience was being urged to protect. It was protons, the cores of
atoms, which are going to be smashed in huge numbers when the #7
billion Texas Super-Colliding Atom-Smashing Machine starts
operations.
A noisy crowd appeared in the gallery brandishing a banner. These
were members of the Proton Liberation Organisation, the new PLO. As
their leader declaimed: "Billions of subatomic particles will be
threatened every picosecond {every trillionth of a second}. Stop
the carnage!"
Several onlookers affirmed that this was one of the best JIR
ceremonies since they began in 1955.