Since 1901, the Nobel Prize has been honoring men and women from all corners of the globe for outstanding achievements in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, economics and for working in peace. The foundations for the prize were laid in 1895 when Alfred Nobel wrote his last will, leaving much of his wealth to the establishment of the Nobel Prize
See: www.NobelPrize.org
The 2008 Winners:
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Chemistry: Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie and Roger Y. Tsien for developing tools for revealing the workings of the cell.
Annals of Improbable Research Magazine
A paradoy of the Nobel Prize, the Ig Nobel Prizes are also given each year in early October — around the time the recipients of the genuine Nobel Prizes are announced — for ten achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.”
Here is a list of the 18th Ig Nobel winners, awarded on Thursday October 2, 2008, at Harvard University, by the Annals of Improbable Research [AIR] magazine.
2008 Ig Nobel Winners:
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Nutrition: Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence for demonstrating that food tastes better when it sounds better.
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Cognitive Science: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Hiroyasu Yamada, Ryo Kobayashi, Atsushi Tero, Akio Ishiguro and Agota Toth for discovering that slime molds can solve puzzles.
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Economics: Geoffrey Miller, Joshua Tyber and Brent Jordan for discovering that exotic dancers earn more when at peak fertility.
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Physics: Dorian Raymer and Douglas Smith for proving that heaps of string or hair will inevitably tangle.
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Chemistry: Sheree Umpierre, Joseph Hill and Deborah Anderson for discovering that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide, and C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu and B.N. Chiang for proving it is not.
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Literature: David Sims for his study “You Bastard: A Narrative Exploration of the Experience of Indignation within Organizations.”
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Peace: The Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology and the citizens of Switzerland for adopting the legal principle that plants’ have dignity.
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Archaeology: Astolfo Gomes de Mello Araujo and Jose Carlos Marcelino for showing armadillos can scramble the contents of an archaeological dig.
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Biology: Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert and Michel Franc for discovering that fleas that live on a dog can jump higher than fleas that live on a cat.
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Medicine: Dan Ariely for demonstrating that expensive fake medicine is more effective than cheap fake medicine.
Assessment
Do we really need Nobel, and Ig Nobel, prize winners each year?
Conclusion
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