Whether Ig Nobels in Their Minds Do Suffer...

The winners of the 2005 Ig Nobel Prizes have been announced by The Annals of Improbable Research. The competition annually recognizes outstanding achievements in the sciences that "first make us laugh, then make us think."

Some of these achievements are worthier of the first reaction than the last. Like the indisputable (and unidentifiable) champions of the Nigerian email pity-party scam; or the inquiry entitled, "Will Humans Swim Faster in Water or Syrup?" (question is, will their results stick?); or the exploration of penguin pooping pressure.

Seemed to me on closer perusal that the 2004 awards were more likely to provoke thought in the long term. I mean, I am still thinking through "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide." Or the study that proved when people are asked to watch for a particular phenomenon in a video, they will completely miss obvious other occurences--in this case, a woman dressed in a gorilla suit--between 30 and 50 percent of the time.

Perhaps more far-reaching, the Ig Nobels have recognized that even the Vatican is going for a global economy of scale.

My greatest gratitude, though, goes to the Ig Nobel board for unearthing the man responsible for karaoke, who received the 2004 Ig Nobel Peace Prize for "inventing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other."

For more heartwarming news about the frontiers of scientific silliness being forged by Spaceship Earth, check the Improbable Research Blog.