Ig Nobel Awards cover the best in bad science

[shenmue]

http://m.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29253796

Projects ranged from the semi-coherent to the truly awful. The winner this year? A Japanese study on why banana peels are slippery!

[Archae]

1. These awards are incomplete.

They should give out a "Hysterics over true science" award to the anti-GMO cultists like Jane Goodall and this guy.

http://americanloons.blogspot.ca/2014/09/1157-jeffery-smith.html

[valerief]

2. Baby shit in sausages?

NUTRITION: Raquel Rubio, of IRTA, Spain, and colleagues, for their study titled "Characterization of Lactic Acid Bacteria Isolated from Infant Faeces as Potential Probiotic Starter Cultures for Fermented Sausages."

This one sounds like YouTube nonsense.
ARCTIC SCIENCE: Eigil Reimers, of the University of Oslo, Norway, and colleagues, for testing how reindeer react to seeing humans who are disguised as polar bears.

[longship]

3. Ig Nobel posts are useless without Miss Sweetie Poo.

She is the final authority at the Ig Nobel award ceremonies to prevent award winners from going on and on in their acceptance speeches. The Iggies take the time limit very, very seriously. As does Miss Sweetie Poo.

Witness:

I hope all of you realize how serious the Ig Nobel Prizes are. That's why so many Nobel Prize winners attend every year. Even the most brilliant scientists have a sense of humor. Thank goodness.

[DJ13]

4. treating "uncontrollable" nosebleeds, using the method of nasal-packing-with-strips-of-cured-pork

[Archae]

7. OT, but figured you'd get a kick out of this video...

&feature=youtu.be

[DJ13]

8. Did he touch it, or not?!

I gotta know!



Thanks.....

[longship]

5. Not necessarily bad science!

It is science that both makes one think, and makes one smile. And there are occasional awards for bad science. But that is not the purpose of the Iggies.

Amongst my favorite Ig Nobel prizes: Dead Duck Day, the first documentation of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck. (BTW, with pictures.)

The Iggies are amongst the greatest science awards on the planet. Actually, one Iggies winner went on to win a real Nobel Prize, and the Ig Nobel prize ceremonies is always attended by many Nobel winners.

It is a really great award in science, as long as one has a sense of humor, which most scientists do.

[KamaAina]

6. Another winner this year was the study that examined the brains of people who see the face of Jesus

and other figures in slices of toast. The work won the neuroscience Ig....

The Toronto scientist explained that this type of pattern recognition was hard-wired, and even chimps experienced it.

"The face you are going to see is determined by your personal expectations or beliefs," he added.

"So, for example, Buddhists might not see Jesus on toast, but they might see a Buddha on toast."