Ig Nobel Awards

The 2003 Ig Nobel awards are out.  The winners are:

Engineering: To John Paul Stapp, Edward A. Murphy, Jr (both posthumous) and George Nichols giving birth in 1949 to Murphy's Law, the basic engineering principle that "If anything can go wrong, it will."

Physics: The Australian team that produced a report on An Analysis Of The Forces Required To Drag Sheep Over Various Surfaces.

Psychology: The Italian and US researchers for their report: Politicians' Uniquely Simple Personalities.

Chemistry: A Japanese researcher who investigated why a bronze statue in the city of Kanazawa did not attract pigeons.

Literature: John Trinkaus for a collection of studies including one that contained data on the percentage of young people who wore baseball caps with the peak facing to the rear rather than to the front.

Economics: Karl Schwarzler and the nation of Liechtenstein for making it possible to rent the entire country for corporate conventions, weddings, bar mitzvahs, and other gatherings.

Interdisciplinary research: A Stockholm University team for its report: Chickens Prefer Beautiful Humans.

Biology: CW Moeliker from the Netherlands for documenting the first scientifically recorded case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck.

Peace: Lal Bihari, of Uttar Pradesh, India, for his campaign to prove he is alive.

Medicine: The University College London team for showing the hippocampus of taxi drivers is bigger than in the general population.

The list of past winners is wonderful.