On September 12, 2024, the 34th presentation ceremony of the Shnobel Prizes (Ig Nobel Prize) took place at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After four years of being held only in an online format due to the pandemic, the event returned to its traditional format with an audience in attendance. The ceremony was organized in cooperation with MIT Press and was also broadcast online.
The awards were given to scientists for achievements that “first make them laugh and then think.” Among the main laureates of the Shnobel Prize 2024 were:
World Prize (USA)
b.f. Skinner was posthumously awarded for his experiments studying the possibility of using living pigeons to guide missiles. The study titled “Pigeons in the Pelican” was published in the magazine American Psychologist. The award at the ceremony was accepted by his daughter, Julie Skinner Vargas.
Botany Award (Germany, Brazil, USA)
Jacob White and Felipe Yamashita received recognition for their discovery that some real plants can mimic the form of neighboring artificial plastic plants. Their work was published in the journal Plant Signaling and Behavior in 2022. Felipe Yamashita was present at the ceremony.
Anatomy Award (France, Chile)
A team of scientists led by Marjolin Willers investigated the direction in which the hair on the heads of most people in the northern and southern hemispheres is twisted (clockwise or counterclockwise). Their research was published in the Journal of Stomatology, Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery in April 2024. The award at the ceremony was received by Marjolin Willers and Roman Honsari.
Medicine Award (Switzerland, Germany, Belgium)
LIVEN A. SHENK, Tahmine Fadai, and Christian Bochelle were awarded for demonstrating that a fake medicine with painful side effects could be more effective than a fake medicine without side effects. Their study was published in the Breen magazine in August 2024. The ceremony was attended by Lyven Shenk.
Physics Prize (USA)
James Liao was recognized for a study in which he demonstrated and explained the ability to levitate a dead trout. His work was published in The Journal of Experimental Biology in 2004 and in the Journal of Fluid Mechanics in 2006. The ceremony was attended by James Liao himself.