Pop-up theatre
For some of those returning to theatres and concert halls, the risk of covid-19 infection is just an extra hazard to grapple with on top of that well-known auditorium danger: getting jostled by other spectators.
A study called , published in the Journal of Cultural Economics, discusses how to attract new audiences by offering boxes, VIP seats and lots and lots of new technology. But that analysis, like many before it, ignores one Louis J. Duprey鈥檚 incredible trapdoor/pop-up seating innovation.
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Duprey invented a system that 鈥減ermits any patron of the theatre to enter or leave his place without at all disturbing other patrons鈥�. His US patent, number 1517774, granted way back in 1924 and modestly titled 鈥淭heater Seating Equipment鈥�, presents .
All theatregoers, upon arriving, stroll into a lobby under the theatre proper. It is filled with special chairs, each mounted on a long tube-within-a-tube sunk into the floor. (The chair is, in this way, rather like a hand stuck on the end of an arm that is encased in a shirtsleeve.) One sits down and turns a knob attached to the seat. The hydraulically powered cylinder-in-a-cylinder apparatus lifts one straight up and through a trap door above. This leads to the auditorium. The trap door closes, becoming the floor.
Not content with just saving us from restive fellows in the stalls, Duprey envisioned a safety benefit. The system provides 鈥渕eans whereby all of the seats of the auditorium may be simultaneously lowered in case of fire or other panic to an exit sub-chamber that is preferably of completely fireproof construction鈥�. That said, his idea never really got off the ground.
How close is too close?
How perfectly circular is personal space? Very, suggests a study called , in the journal Acta Psychologica.
The notion of personal space is a bit nebulous, and the study acknowledges that it is hard to get people to agree to a definition. Regardless, the researchers suspected that an individual鈥檚 personal space has a definite shape, and that it is a self-centred horizontal circle. They tried to measure the soundness of the roundness of that circle.
The study involved various encounters between live humans, virtual human avatars and a 鈥渓ife-size, gender-neutral mannequin鈥� with 鈥渁 bald Styrofoam head with glass eyes鈥�. The dummy, according to the report, was mounted on a height-adjustable, wheeled tripod and wore a grey coat.
The researchers conclude that, with the exception of 鈥渧ery minor idiosyncrasies鈥�, personal space is indeed circular. The most major minor idiosyncrasy, they specify, is evident when a person is confronted simultaneously with two virtual avatars, one approaching from the left and the other passively standing off to the right. Persons tended to feel 鈥渃omfortable鈥� letting the approaching avatar get extra close.
What is the preferred radius of the personal-space circle? That depends. But one can gather numbers, even if you don鈥檛 get into the why of them. The researchers say their numbers accord nicely with those they had seen in a study called , which was published in the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology. That project asked people in 42 countries to indicate, using paper-and-pencil versions of two human silhouettes, how close is too close.
People in different countries had different keep-your-distances. Argentinians, on average, were the happiest to be closely approached. They welcomed strangers to get a mere 65 centimetres from them 鈥� well within touching distance. Those in some other countries 鈥� Romania, Hungary, Saudi Arabia and Turkey 鈥� preferred much more space, indicating strangers ought to stay at least twice that far away.
Hold the chillis
A new study called caught the attention of Tom Gill. Gill, who is an Earth scientist at the University of Texas at El Paso, told Feedback: 鈥淚 have no idea what spicy water is.鈥�
However, some oceanographers do have an idea. Two decades ago, Pierre Flament wrote a now much-cited defining water spiciness. This he published in the journal Progress in Oceanography. It is nine pages long. An imprecise definition might say: water that is warm and salty is 鈥渟picy鈥�.
Oceanographers speak also of 鈥渕inty鈥� water. Compared to spicy water, minty water is cool (lower in temperature) and fresher (less saline). Gualtiero Spiro Jaeger鈥檚 recent short treatise, 鈥溾�楽picy鈥� & 鈥楳inty鈥� Water鈥�, in the journal Oceanus, tells how the two oceanography concepts are used to analyse mixing. Specifically, that which does or doesn鈥檛 happen when two big blobs of water with contrasting qualities meet.
These culinary words can express somewhat different meanings when deployed by, say, advertisers of salsa and mouthwash. Or by chemists, as one sees in Doris R. Kimbrough鈥檚 1997 paper in the Journal of Chemical Education. Called , it sings the earthy mealtime merits of chemicals that are spicy (capsaicin, piperine and zingerone) or cool (menthol and carvone). Water gets barely a mention. Marc Abrahams
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