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Letter: Letters : Feedback fooled

Published 5 July 1997

From Susan Hewitt and Ed Subitzky

New York

Ed Subitzky and I were delighted to see our work finally appear on the pages
of New Scientist.

The final item in Feedback (14 June),
on “the ultimate disclaimer notice”,
sent in by Adam Quantrill, is in fact an extract from a science humour piece we
wrote in 1990 that was published in The Journal of Irreproducible
Results in 1991.

Strangely, we did submit the whole piece to New Scientist in 1990,
thinking it might do for an April Fools’ Day issue but it was turned down much
to our disappointment.

However, by the strange karma of modern communications the piece, having
found its own way onto the Internet and having knocked around there for years,
caught the eye of one of your readers, who sent it to the Feedback column.
Somehow the piece fulfilled its own destiny by sneaking in the back door of the
magazine when no one was looking.

Issue no. 2089 published 5 July 1997

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