Wikipedia defines irony as “a rhetorical device, literary technique, or event in which what appears, on the surface, to be the case, differs radically from what is actually the case”. I would say that evidence showing restroom hand dryers are circulating fecal bacteria throughout the room and depositing that bacteria on freshly washed hands is ironic, especially considering the bacteria-phobic culture that is at least partly responsible for hands-free air dryers.
I also find it ironic that in an effort to have access to local honey, people in cities have begun a blossoming culture of urban beekeeping, only to find that bees will harvest asphalt to make the propolis which is the mortar of a beehive. Whether or not the asphalt that has been detected in propolis is present in honey is undetermined, but regardless this story illustrates the sometimes unexpected ways ecology emerges into our awareness.
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