Honors were given and accepted amidst a hail of paper airplanes at this year's Ig Nobel awards ceremony, going to, among others, the board and officers of the American Nudist Research Library -- "for preserving nudist history so that everyone can see it" -- and the inventor of the karaoke machine.
The inventor of the karaoke machine, Daisuke Inoue of Hyogo, Japan, won this year's Peace prize for "providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other," said Abrahams.
Inoue, speaking in his best broken English, accepted the prize, and glowed before the evening's only standing ovation. He then launched into a karaoke version of the old Coca-Cola jingle, "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing."
Other honors went to the researchers who proved the "five second rule," by which it is established that it's safe to eat something that's been dropped on the floor so long as it's recovered within five seconds, and researchers who proved that Herrings communicate by farting.
The Ig Nobel award for engineering went to Donald J. Smith and his father, the late Frank J. Smith, for patenting their version of the comb-over.
Frank Smith, whose wife often hid his hair spray in an attempt to stop him from combing over his bald spot, wanted to preserve the technique for future generations.
"It's not about hair," said Frank Smith's grandson, Scott Jackson Smith, mockingly. "It's about heritage."
Many of the winners were genuinely appreciative of their awards, without which their research would have remained obscure. As the Annals of Improbable Research, the organization behind the awards, likes to say, they "make people Laugh, then Think."
Infra
La Crosse, WI
November 2003
OCT 05, 2004 11:00 AM