WE LIKE IT, but is it science?
Self-styled bio-artist Adam Zaretsky pushed back aesthetic boundaries last
week by spending eight days in the Workhorse Zoo, a tiny glass-walled room at
the Salina Art Center, Kansas.
For company, he had live specimens of the 鈥渨orkhorse鈥� laboratory animals
used in molecular biology: bacteria, yeast, flies, worms, fish, frogs, mice and plants.
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鈥淚鈥檓 trying to skew the relationship between nature and culture,鈥� Zaretsky
said. 鈥淣ot for hundreds of generations have these lab animals lived together in
an environment in which they can interact.鈥�
Watched by the general public through the glass and filmed by a webcam,
Zaretsky brewed beer with yeast and paddled in a tub with an albino
Xenopusfrog and some zebrafish. The organisms in the room were encouraged
to eat each other. Zaretsky himself, clad in a suit jacket, leopard-spotted
loincloth and black cowboy boots, dined on frog stir-fried with zebrafish with a
side salad of Arabidopsis.
For his other basic functions, he was equipped with a Porta Potti and, to
preserve his modesty, a red vinyl 鈥減rivacy cone鈥� attached to a ceiling
pulley.
鈥淭his is something that just doesn鈥檛 happen in Salina, Kansas,鈥� commented
17-year-old Jessica Andrewson, a local high school student. 鈥淚t really freaked
me out.鈥� It seems she was impressed, though. She asked Zaretsky to marry
her.
For a record of the event, go to
www.salinaartcenter.org/uv/workhorse_site/wwww.html
WHILE working at Thales Training and Simulation in south London recently,
reader Nic Plum was alarmed to read on the door of the gents toilet:
鈥淐aution鈥擶et Floor Signs.鈥� He says he never dared stop long enough to find
out what it was that made the signs so dangerous.
WHEN Arthur Andersen鈥檚 business consulting and technology arm unexpectedly
changed its name to Accenture last year, it was obviously striving for a new
image. Now its efforts to distance itself from the rest of Andersen look even
more necessary, thanks to the parent company鈥檚 unfortunate role in the Enron debacle.
So Accenture executives were doing their best to woo the powerful and wealthy
at the World Economic Forum in New York on 2 and 3 February.
First, they sent out an e-mail inviting key participants to a working dinner
entitled 鈥淭he media made me do it鈥�. Sadly, the attachment containing the crucial
information about where, when and what time the event would take place crashed
computers running the Windows operating system.
Then, when frustrated invitees tried to reply to the e-mail to ask for the
information in a more accessible format, Accenture鈥檚 return address turned
out to be invalid.
Meanwhile, the forum鈥檚 august participants had been queuing for hours to get
the latest must-have gadget鈥攁 hand-held computer called the Davos
Companion, which was running Accenture鈥檚 software. With this device,
participants were told, they could e-mail each other and sign up to attend
sessions with the likes of Bill Clinton, the King of Jordan and Desmond
Tutu.
Unfortunately, the Davos Companion proved no more reliable than Accenture鈥檚
e-mail attachment. The sight of wealthy CEOs and heads of state beseeching
organisers to let them into sessions they鈥檇 been unable to book must have had
Accenture鈥檚 PR gurus weeping into their cocktails.
IT IS well known that The New York Times is one of the world鈥檚 great
newspapers, but surely there are limits to what it is capable of. Go to the
paper鈥檚 website at www.nytimes.com and the first button you can click on is
鈥淧ersonalize your weather鈥�. How do they do that?
ALEC JEFFREYS and his colleagues at the University of Leicester have
published several important papers on population genetics. Their big idea is to
investigate the human population by collecting sperm samples and looking at the
DNA. In the group鈥檚 papers鈥攑ublished over the past five or so years in
such prestigious places as Nature Genetics, Molecular Cell and
Human Molecular Genetics鈥攖hey head up their acknowledgements by
thanking a person called Jane Blower 鈥渇or supplying semen samples鈥�.
Feedback wouldn鈥檛 dare to interfere by asking Jeffreys and co if Jane Blower
really exists . . . but we do wonder whether the same question ever occurred to
the editors of the worthy publications their work appears in. And if not, why
not?
READER Fred Brandt once bought a lifetime subscription to the magazine Bridge
World. When it arrived each month, it came with an address sticker saying
鈥渓ife鈥�. At the end of 1999 this changed to 鈥�2265鈥�, promising Brandt a truly
staggering innings. Sadly, he reports that it has now gone back to saying 鈥渓ife鈥�
again.
THE CARE label on an Isabel de Pedro skirt reads: 鈥淚ron back side with low
迟别尘辫别谤补迟耻谤别鈥�
THE FRONT of a bottle of Radox Herbal Bath declares that it is a 鈥淪ecret
Blend of Herbs And Minerals鈥�.
On the back, the label states: 鈥淚ngredients: Aqua, Sodium Laureth Sulfate,
Sodium Chloride, Parfum, Lavandula Angustifolia, Cocamidopropyl Betaine,
Cocamide DEA, Dipropylene Glycol, Propylene Glycol, Benzophenone-3, Sodium
Benzoate, Sodium Lactate, Lactic Acid, Methylchloroisothiazolinone,
Methylisothiazolinone, Tetrasodium EDTA, Citric Acid, CI 42090, CI 17200.鈥�
OLD ATTITUDES die hard. Reader Joanna Bangs bought a Deta voltage-testing
screwdriver. The instructions told her: 鈥淭ests and verifies the connection of
wire, plug, toaster, etc. Even women and children could easily identify 鈥楪ood鈥�
or 鈥榖ad鈥� fuse, bulb, etc.鈥�
FINALLY, the box containing Tsunami 鈥淪hadow Series鈥� computer speakers
that reader Nick Kyrke-Smith purchased carried the enigmatic warning:
鈥淧lease read the product instruction carefully before you use and don鈥檛 use
on the other purpose which the instruction does not mention.鈥�