Å®ÉúСÊÓƵ

GOOD to see that the frontiers of science are still being pushed forward
by one of Feedback’s favourite magazines, The Jour nal of Irreproducible
Results. The July/ August issue features a determined attempt to resolve
experimentally the vexed problem of boiling eggs at high altitudes. Researcher
Rene Loretan, of Zurich, Switzerland, and his colleagues Anna-Rosa and Christophe
from Berne, succeeded in boiling a dozen eggs at an altitude of 1950 metres
in the Swiss Alps, using an AEG kitchen stove and a stainless-steel pan
with enamel coating.

The eggs, numbered from 1 to 12 and carefully weighed and measured,
were boiled for lengths of time varying from 3 to 16 minutes. They were
then sliced in half and examined internally to ascertain the thickness of
the whites and the yokes. Loretan acknowledges that the experiment left
one or two areas open for further research. In particular, the comparative
boiling times for similar sized eggs at lower altitudes were not experimentally
arrived at, but only assessed subjectively by Anna-Rosa on the basis of
her experience as a cook. An element of subjectivity may also have crept
into the decision about when the eggs could be called ‘boiled’. (Personally,
Feedback prefers them runny in the middle.) So the experiment was, in Loretan’s
words, ‘fairly irreproducible’. Nevertheless, the fully tabulated results
have now been published for posterity, together with the somewhat random
conclusion that an egg must be boiled for an extra 8.6 seconds for every
100 metres of altitude.

Feedback readers are invited to submit the results of any similarly
absurd and irreproducible experiments they have cooked up.

* * *

IT GOES without saying that the offices of New Å®ÉúСÊÓƵ are a no-smoking
zone. However, a few members of staff are still addicted to the weed, and
during those rare moments when the intensity of work-pressure eases off
a little, these may sometimes be seen furtively indulging their habit beside
the photocopier in the corridor.

Last week one of these benighted souls, who rolls his own cigarettes,
drew a passing Feedback’s attention to the intriguing advertisement printed
on the inside of a packet of Rizzla papers. Headlined ‘As seen on the BBC’s
Tomorrow’s World’, the advertisement extolled the virtues of a product called
the ‘Phototron IIITM’, which, it said, ‘will double the growth rate of any
plant through a precise methodology known as ‘Growing Plants Pyraponimetrically

Feedback did not doubt for one minute the efficacy of this invention,
but was greatly puzzled why the company’s marketing strategists should have
chosen to advertise it on packets of cigarette papers. What ‘target market
segment’ was being aimed at here? It took an acquaintance who used to be
a hippy in the sixties to point out that tobacco is not the only plant that
some people roll up in their cigarette papers . . .

* * *

TALKING of what are known in legal circles as ‘substances’, Feedback
was startled to receive unsolicited through the post the other day a small
plastic package containing two large brown pills. The package was stapled
to a sheet of paper which promised that the two attached pills would give
the user’s body a ‘potent ‘charge’ that lasts all day’. Other benefits included
‘added mental alertness’ and ‘suppression of appetite’. The missive concluded
with the exhortation: ‘JOURNALISTS! . . . TRY ONE YOURSELF AND SEE!’

In fact, these pills had been sent by a company, Naturally First, which
was marketing its new vitamin and herbal supplement ‘Excell’. Alarmingly,
the company gave no list of the ingredients in the pills, other than to
say they contain the ‘almost legendary herb’ Guarana. Nevertheless, Feedback
swallowed one immediately.

Sad to say, any excelling that took place went unremarked.

* * *

DISGUSTED with tap water?’ asked the sticker left on Feedback’s car
recently. It went on to promise the ‘equivalent of bottled water on tap’.
This magic trick is performed by a water filter, of which over a million
have already been sold at up to Pounds sterling 190 each.

We would have more confidence in this splendid invention if the makers
did not add that the device is ‘bacteriarized’. If this means anything,
surely it indicates that the water filter adds lots of lovely salmonella,
listeria and other bugs to the sterilised water that comes out of the tap.

* * *

AND NOW, let’s get down to basics. We hear that German authorities worried
about the deluge of sewage into the upper reaches of the Danube have installed
meters in homes along the famous waterway to measure not only the water
used, but also the waste discharged. Surcharges have been suggested for
those whose rush to flush threatens to turn the historic river from ‘Blue’
to ‘Loo’.

Feedback applauds this idea, but is concerned that the meters could
have an inhibiting effect on the area’s citizens. If this is the case, citizens
feeling the strain (so to speak) will be delighted to know that the British
Digestive Foundation has awarded a grant of Pounds sterling 20 000 to a
research project into the use of hypnosis to relieve constipation. Apparently,
a problem in severe cases of this complaint is that some patients contract,
rather than relax, the relevant muscles at the crucial moment. In the new
study, selected patients will be taught to relax their muscles using ‘a
visual pressure display’ which records their own muscular activities via
a device which is inserted in the (sorry about this) rectum. Their success
will be measured against that of another group trying to achieve the same
end (as it were) through self-hypnosis.

This has to be the bottom line.