CatCave9 S02E04: Unicorneri, Beetle investments, and Science March

Despite the Easter holidays being in full bloom, the Lausannois convened numerously to watch MC Mark and his 8 Catalysers sprout some science in the underground humor plantation that is Cinema Oblo.We watched our Catalyzers make up expressive interpretations of pedestrian bridges to excuse their co-workers. We watched the periodic table being ridden up and down at random inter-element intervals.

We watched our Catalyzers make up expressive interpretations of pedestrian bridges to excuse their co-workers. We watched the periodic table being ridden up and down at random inter-element intervals.

Our speaker in the science guest-spot was Ornela de Gasperin from the Chapuisat group at UNIL. Ornela told us about her research into good shit that goes round during the breeding of burying beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides), and their social interactions with mites. Our Catalysers wove that into a story about real-estate purchases, macro and microscopic house owners, and human locomotion.

In our CatCave9 JournalCouch we discuss (and act on) some research we recently read! Here’s what went down:

• We learned that “Children tend to be hit by cars more, just because they’re children. And adults don’t because they know streets.”, as one of the improvisers put it. Instead of relying on this crude summary (which was admittedly very funny), we recommend you check out the paper ¹⁾ O’Neal, E. E., Jiang, Y., Franzen, L. J., Rahimian, P., Yon, J. P., Kearney, J. K., & Plumert, J. M. (2017). Changes in Perception-Action Tuning Over Long Time Scales: How Children and Adults Perceive and Act on Dynamic Affordances When Crossing Roads. Journal of Experimental Psychology. Human Perception and Performance. https://doi.org/10.1037/xhp0000378  yourself!
• Adria told us about population oscillations in groups of ants, that can enable them to cooperatively transport large loads ²⁾ Gelblum, A., Pinkoviezky, I., Fonio, E., Ghosh, A., Gov, N., & Feinerman, O. (2015). Ant groups optimally amplify the effect of transiently informed individuals. Nature Communications, 6, 7729. https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms8729 ³⁾ Gelblum, A., Pinkoviezky, I., Fonio, E., Gov, N. S., & Feinerman, O. (2016). Emergent oscillations assist obstacle negotiation during ant cooperative transport. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113(51), 14615–14620. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1611509113 .

In our last game, we had 4 scenes compete, and magically meet! Starting from the suggestions: Bear, Stick of Truth, March for Science, and Unicornerus, our dear audience voted us down to a Science March congregating onto the “World of the Esoteric” Shoppe. You should have been there, it was unforgettably majestic — or have you ever seen a Unicornerus being ridden by the fairy godmother?

If you didn’t make it, don’t feel bad! Just come to our next show on Thursday 18th May at Cinema Oblo, and mention “Unicornerus” at the bar for a 10% discount.

When you don’t trust your employees.

Pre-show

Fairy godmother mounts up. On a Unicornerus.

Sister mary explains her move from bioluminescence to other godly light sources

Make Robbie dense again.

Science couch, without couch.

Poor Patrick had to sing again.

The printer didn’t work properly.

F(ast) e(nd) of the previous slide!

This excuse was out of bounds.

C(an) a(nybody) remember what the last line was?

Welcome to the.. ESOTERIC DEPARTMENT!