back to article Pretending to be a badger wins Oxford Don 10 TRILLION DOLLARS

The annual Ig Nobel Prizes were handed out on Thursday night, as always “honoring achievements that make people laugh, then think”. Among this year's winners were “Charles Foster, for living in the wild as, at different times, a badger, an otter, a deer, a fox, and a bird.” Foster turned that research into a book, Being a …

  1. frank ly

    Being a Beast Hardcover

    I read that as 'Being a Beast Hardcore' which seems appropriate, especially if you read the synopsis in the link. (It's actually called 'Being a Beast'. Oh, those sub editors.)

    It would have been great if he'd attended the ceremony to accept his prize, dressed as a badger.

  2. Frumious Bandersnatch

    From Junior to Senior Pinocchio

    I'm always touched by that moment in the story myself, where he realises he's not a real boy. The part where his hand catches fire.

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: Senior Pinocchio

      ... just found my new pet name for Donald Trump!

    2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      Re: From Junior to Senior Pinocchio

      Did they interview Tony Blair one thousand times to get a statistically significant sample?

      1. hplasm
        Coat

        Re: From Junior to Senior Pinocchio

        Q: How do you know a politician is lying?

        A: He's Tony Blair.

        Thanks, all week, veal etc.

        1. You aint sin me, roit
          Coat

          Re: From Junior to Senior Pinocchio

          Q: How do you know a politician is lying?

          A. You can see their lips moving.

  3. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
    Happy

    You have got to love the Igs!

    That prize for chemistry is well deserved

    I actually gave a lecture on the topic of improbable research for PhD students last week (entitled "And Now For Something Completely Different, or, On The Importance of Not (Always) Being Earnest"), including my own work on a quantum-mechanical interpretation of homeopathy (it might work if you don't look), zero-tolerance maths, and the Craske-Trumpe theorem. I also discussed various Ig winner, including the team from our university who investigated what goes on during sex with an MRI scanner. Iwould have loved to have been able to include some of the latest crop of Igs!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Pint

      Re: You have got to love the Igs!

      Oooh! Nice paper. [Cogno-Intellectualism, Rhetorical Logic, and the

      Craske-Trump Theorem] I also liked the award to VW. As we've recently come too see, it's an engineering technique with cross-disciplinary application in oh so many applications,

      1. Lars Silver badge

        Re: You have got to love the Igs!

        Interestingly VW is still the least polluting car in Europe according to this study.

        https://www.transportenvironment.org/press/dieselgate-1st-anniversary-all-diesel-car-brands-europe-are-even-more-polluting-volkswagen

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: You have got to love the Igs!

      What everyone really wants to know is...

      did you give a practical demonstration of the Ig Nobel prize winning technique of curing hiccups using digital rectal massage.

      Coat's on, I'm going...

      1. Anonymous Cow Herder

        curing hiccups using digital rectal massage

        Everything is computers these days. (Paul Merton)

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
          Coat

          Re: curing hiccups using digital rectal massage

          Really? Doesn't sound like the sort of thing Paul Murton would say.

          The Tartan one please.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    as a bird?

    THIS I must see... His research project must have been strongly lacking in academic value without the indispensable mating in flight...

  5. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge

    Goat Buddy

    Photographs and video on BBC News...

    Fascinating, if a little bizarre on occasions, was Mr Thwaites' verdict on the whole venture. He developed a strong bond with one animal in particular - a "goat buddy", but also very nearly kicked off a big confrontation at one point.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-37443204

  6. x 7

    randy old goat.

    anyone else would have been locked up

  7. DropBear
    Gimp

    “prosthetic extensions of his limbs that allowed him to move in the manner of, and spend time roaming hills in the company of, goats.”

    ...hmmm, I'm pretty sure I can see at least one commercial application here...

  8. This post has been deleted by its author

  9. JLV

    good reminder

    >The Ig Nobels are misunderstood as deriding rubbish science, but are actually about celebrating how even seemingly-obscure science gets us thinking.

    The first time I heard of them was for, among other things, handing out an award for investigating the mathematical basis for ropes and strings tangling up.

    Seems totally pointless, and well deserving of derision from the Trump/Cruz crowd for wasting tax payer money.

    Until you think of how many accidents involve people or things getting caught up in tangled cables.

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