Ja, ja, ze zijn er weer. De zeer belangrijke Ig Nobel prijzen “For achievements that first make people LAUGH then make them THINK”.
Let op, dit zijn echt serieuze onderzoeken die uitgevoerd worden door tal van gerenommeerde universiteiten over de hele wereld.
Natuurlijk past het thema “first laugh then think” bij de doelstellingen van een echte frisdenker.
Vorig jaar berichtte ik al over deze geweldige prijzenregen en ook dit jaar was het weer raak.
Een scala aan prijzen werd uitgedeeld in verschillende research velden.
Hier een handig overzicht van de winners van 2013:
MEDICINE PRIZE:
“Assessing the effect of listening to opera, on heart transplant patients who are mice”.
PSYCHOLOGY PRIZE:
“Confirming, by experiment, that people who think they are drunk also think they are attractive”.
(met Nederlandse inbreng!)
BIOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY PRIZE:
“Discovering that when dung beetles get lost, they can navigate their way home by looking at the Milky Way”.
PHYSICS PRIZE:
“Discovering that some people would be physically capable of running across the surface of a pond — if those people and that pond we’re on the moon”.
CHEMISTRY PRIZE:
“Discovering that the biochemical process by which onions make people cry is even more complicated than scientists previously realized”.
PEACE PRIZE:
“President of Belarus, for making it illegal to applaud in public, AND to the Belarus State Police, for arresting a one-armed man for applauding”.
PROBABILITY PRIZE:
“For making two related discoveries: First, that the longer a cow has been lying down, the more likely that cow will soon stand up; and Second, that once a cow stands up, you cannot easily predict how soon that cow will lie down again”.
(met Nederlandse inbreng!)
PUBLIC HEALTH PRIZE:
“For the medical techniques described in their report “Surgical Management of an Epidemic of Penile Amputations in Siam” — techniques which they recommend, except in cases where the amputated penis had been partially eaten by a duck”.
(288)
