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The Absurdity of the Nobel Prizes in Science (theatlantic.com)
An anonymous reader shares an article: Every year, when Nobel Prizes are awarded in physics, chemistry, and physiology or medicine, critics note that they are an absurd and anachronistic way of recognizing scientists for their work. Instead of honoring science, they distort its nature, rewrite its history, and overlook many of its important contributors. There are assuredly good things about the prizes. Scientific discoveries should be recognized for the vital part they play in the human enterprise. The Nobel Prize website is an educational treasure trove, full of rich historical details that are largely missing from published papers. And it is churlish to be overly cynical about any event that, year after year, offers science the same kind of whetted anticipation that's usually reserved for Oscar or Emmy nominees. But the fact that the scientific Nobels have drawn controversy since their very inception hints at deep-rooted problems. [...] The wider problem, beyond who should have received the prize and who should not, is that the Nobels reward individuals -- three at most, for each of the scientific prizes, in any given year. And modern science, as Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus write in Stat, is "the teamiest of team sports." Yes, researchers sometimes make solo breakthroughs, but that's increasingly rare. Even within a single research group, a platoon of postdocs, students, and technicians will typically be involved in a discovery that gets hitched to a single investigator's name. And more often than not, many groups collaborate on a single project. The paper in which the LIGO team announced their discovery has an author list that runs to three pages. Another recent paper, which precisely estimated the mass of the elusive Higgs boson, has 5,154 authors.
The Nobel prizes awarded for science always seem to make sense. The literature ones most of the time too. It's the peace prizes (e.g., Obama in first year as president...whaaa?) that often leave people shaking their heads.
But the fact that the scientific Nobels have drawn controversy since their very inception hints at deep-rooted problems
Well, why don't you start a company, make a few $$$$ Billion and then you can establish science-based prizes according to your wishes?
Seriously. They seem to me to be a great way of acknowledging some aspects of scientific endeavour. They probably aren't perfect, but what is?
To gripe on about them sounds like an easy, lazy, route. Either that or sour grapes from the people who missed out. Especially when the alternative is nothing compared to the publicity and financial rewards the Nobels offer.
I suspect that whatever changes were proposed, there would be someone, somewhere, who would find reasons to complain about that, too. But since no scientists (or nominees in other fields) actually starts out with the intention to win a Nobel, it's just a nice little extra if or when the phone call comes.
Try to be a little more easy-going and less discontented with the world.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
But it never is, for two reasons:
a) you can't generally get a good feel for the importance of an achievement in that short a timeframe
b) there's a backlog. They can't give it to the person who deserves it this year because they need to give to the guy who deserved ten years ago--who didn't get it then because at that time they needed to give it to the guy who deserved it ten years before that, who didn't get it then for the same reason, etc., etc.
This is much more of a problem for physics than other fields. While there are physics papers with massive numbers of authors, even in biology one won't see more than about 30 authors. And in math it is rare for a paper to have more than 3 or 4 authors- so the equivalent award there, the Fields Medal, is completely reasonable. In some of the physical sciences such as physics one has these very large author lists, and it isn't always completely clear how much actual work was done by some of the people on the collaborations; astronomy seems to be in a similar situation (but since astronomy doesn't have its own famous award, it doesn't come up in this context).
Note also that Nobel's original will did not have the restriction to 3 people, although it actually had an intent of it going to a single person https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred_nobel/will/will-full.html, so if we're going to allow it to go to multiple, why stop at 3? On the other hand, it seems that people understand that when someone like the director of LIGO gets the prize that they are functionally getting it for the project as a whole.
The economics prize was a later add on by bankers.
Nobel Prizes became irrelevant in 2007. That's when the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to Al Gore and the 676 authors of the fourth IPCC assessment report. There was a time when the Nobel Peace Prize was a significant award. Apparently now you can get one for writing a small piece of a highly politicized work of fiction. Nobel Prizes should be reserved for those who make significant and useful accomplishments, not for creating propaganda.
And you're dialed in to this? Ya, cool.
Of course it's subjective, biased, and controversial.
Celebrity imposed on science, what could go wrong?
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Another A/C commenting on itself? AYSO U6 season over already?
What we need to do is make sure that everyone who does science gets a nobel participation trophy, to show that we value their work too. That will ensure the awards retain their meaning and value that so far has only been managed by exclusivity and competitive merit.
Listen - there's plenty of flaws with the Nobel prizes - historically, lots of prizes that logically should have gone to women were given to their nearest male colleague, and lots of other reflections of the time they lived in. Lots of real heroes forgotten if that's all you go by.
But that's not really a a big deal in the scope of things. Why?
Because, the Nobel prizes are a story. A story about a guy involved in the creation of TNT, who started a big fund that pays folks to recognize the advancement of science.
For most folks, they're basically one of a dozen or so science stories that they'll even see in a year.
They're like the Oscars of popularized science. And like the Oscars, they're mostly a pageant and a hollow spectacle - they're not even the tip of the iceburg as far as science goes - but they're what inspires countless kids to take a peek into a world they would otherwise never imagine.
So, flawed as they are - they're still a small shining light in the darkness. They're fine for what they are.
Ryan Fenton
All three of those prizes do recognize. You can maybe argue that literature has been overly focused on European literature and even more so on Swedish literature to the exclusion of others, and with a very specific idea of what counts as "literature" (See some discussion here http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2008/10/nobel_gas.html). But the works being recognized are still major literary achievements.
However, the Peace prize has for all its issues, recognized some real accomplishments. Last year, the prize went to Juan Manuel Santos for his work trying to end the ongoing violence in Columbia, and although the initial peace deal was rejected by the voters, the follow-up seems to be really holding and FARC seems to have been mostly disarmed. Real progress can occur.
The Economics prize has also gone for serious and substantial work. (Note that the Econ prize is actually from a separate grant and awarded by a separate body (hence being referred to at the Nobel Memorial Prize officially rather than the Nobel Prize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Memorial_Prize_in_Economic_Sciences) .) Examples of substantial work include the 2005 prize to Schelling and Aumann recognized major work that is relevant not just to understanding economics, but many related fields including general negotiation theory and some aspects of what is sometimes called political economy. For example, the idea of a Schelling point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focal_point_(game_theory) has found its way into standard negotiating texts, and it is useful for simply making people more likely to come to agreements. Similarly, Aumann's agreement theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aumann's_agreement_theorem is important not just in economics (for understanding how markets behave) but has also become relevant in philosophy as well as AI research. This is not the only example in econ, just one of the more blatant.
That you personally really like certain specific STEM fields says more about you than it does about the prizes.
Instead of complaining do as follows:
1.) Invent some amazing stuff, or write the great american novel.
2.) Make a shitload of money.
3.) When you die, set up a foundation to recognize human achievement, scientific ones in particular, with better citeria than the novel.
See? Is not that hard. You can do it. Focus your energy in these 3 simple steps, instead of using it to complain about what dear old anachronistic Alfred did way back when....
PS: For those who did RTFA (the vast majority), Ed Yong is the author of TFA in The Atlantic.
*** Suerte a todos y Feliz dia!
I see you're weak snark and raise you the basis for my personal translation of the nobel prize.
it is because I stood upon the shoulder of giants.
It's unfair to award anyone a prize anymore, the Oscar winners couldn't have done it without their co-stars, make-up, script writers, director, location scouts, sound team, producers and everything else.
Usain bolt wouldn't have been as fast if he didn't have the team behind him he does (nutritionist, coaches etc.)
Team Sky cycling readily admit their whole philosophy is based on marginal gains, that all come from lots of different people, but only Chris Froome won the tour.
As for the things the Nobel prizes celebrate, there's not enough praise for "peace", "physics", "medicine" etc. They're the parts of humanity we should be aiming to lift to the highest heights. Instead we glorify vapid celebrity, people who win "got Talent" shows, and has-beens going around again on some dancing show. Even if the Nobels are misplaced, I'd rather have 1000 of them than another over-paid idiot gurning for the camera thanking God, their family and friends for all they've done.
There are scientists (e.g., theoretical physicists) who will not publish with more than two coauthors because they think their science is high-level enough that it could win them a Nobel. But each Nobel can be shared by a maximum of three people, so anyone else gets pushed to the acknowledgements or left out to begin with.
It was an estimation carried out to several decimal places, and was therefore a high precision estimate.
Please do not confuse "precision" with "accuracy."
"Precisely estimated"? How the hell do you precisely "estimate" something?
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
Are you saying, "it's the gravity of the issue?"
It's cool, it's like watching a slow child realize the value of a light switch.
Precision and accuracy are different things; precision just means you used very small units.
That being said, you can still estimate accurately, too. It means your error margin is very small.
A paper has 5,154 "authors"? Did each one contribute two words to the paper? That's absurd!
The truth is that the work described in the paper had 5154 contributors ranging from minor to major contributions. How were those split up? Were there three of them that provided the key breakthroughs/insights? Or was the paper instead primarily the product of the routine boring plodding work of 2000 of them? A workforce of 5000 people must need HR and catering and bureaucrats - should these be listed as authors too because their work was equally invaluable? Which of those 5154 people could be replaced by others who are have a general professional knowledge of the field, vs which ones provided unique insights that wouldn't have been expected of a notionally skilled worker? (to borrow a criterion from patent law).
I don't think the number "5154 authors" is evidence -- it doesn't bolster the argument in the article.
>> You can maybe argue that literature has been overly focused on ...Swedish literature to the exclusion of others...
I tried to get into Swedish lit but I just couldn't get past the fact that every tenth word started with "B" and rhymed with "pork".
This is much more of a problem for physics than other fields.
I'm sorry - why is it a problem?
What does anyone care what other people do with their money? They have implemented their own vision of trying to help, and it's not the same as *your* vision, so you want to change theirs?
People seem to feel that the point of the Nobels is the science, there's a sizeable psychological benefit. It's something to strive for, something to dream about, and it's a sort of lottery for geeks. Similar to an athlete's $10m salary.
For evenly-distributed awards for everyone who does work, consider government research grants. Those are given out evenly for anyone willing to do the work, with a little left over to pay the researchers for the time it takes, and when you are done you can apply for another one.
Government grants generate no romantic dreams to work towards, and no excitement when you're on the path or perhaps a potential recipient. If you distribute the Nobel prize money evenly, it'll be just a small year-end salary bonus. Welcome and pleasant, but also detached and irrelevant.
I'm in favour of keeping the Nobel prizes the way they are - it gives us something to strive for and dream about.
Also, that thing about caring what other people do with their money.
That you personally really like certain specific STEM fields says more about you than it does about the prizes.
It says that they understand science and the scientific process, and that elaborate 'stamp collector using numbers' disciplines like Economics have their place in the body of human knowledge, but are not Science.
Nobel prize picking three per year or a paper with 5000 authors?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Um, did you read the post I was responding to? They said the other prizes "don't recognize much of anything"- if they had said just that the other prizes weren't for science, that would be trivially true.
Look at the laureates of the peace prize. Especially in recent history.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
often ignored by the Nobel prizes.
https://www.ias.edu/ideas/usef...
*"Cogito Ergo Liberalis"*
The AC who posted this was nominated for chemistry Nobel prize, but didn't get it.
"Don't like certain specific STEM fields" can be interpreted as you insisting that they are scientific fields. You asserting that GP commenter 'doesn't like' them is a churlish way of insisting they are 'science'.
Yes, when snark recurses sometimes it gets confusing.
Should they put the name of the guys working at the power plant who supplied LIGO with power? The guys who championed LIGO have spent the last 40 years, basically their entire professional lives on something that could have been a complete dud. There is some value in that....
love is just extroverted narcissism
Now THERE's some scientific consensus for you. LOL
Ray Weiss has worked with incredible persistence against great odds to get LIGO to happen. He's also (based on my limited experience meeting him 40 years ago) a really nice, down-to-earth guy. I'm delighted that he won. He's absolutely deserves this award, and it's annoying to see a post on Slashdot carping about it instead of celebrating it.
Precision doesn't necessarily refer to the size of the units, but can also be a reference to how closely grouped a set of values are. Tightly grouped values are considered precise. For example, if you were to shoot arrows at a target and all of them were a low and to the left and had all of your shots hit the outermost ring of the target, but had them all hit within an almost impossibly small distance of each other, you would not be very accurate, but you would be quite precise. Whereas someone with a wider spread, but closer to the middle on average would be said to be more accurate, but less precise.
The Nobel Prize is not awarded for achievements, it is an inspiration for greatness. Your position is based on a misconception.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Yeah, I was careful to not say that. I said that the commentator liked certain STEM fields, not that they didn't like others, but I can see how one could have read it as you have. I suppose the snarky aspect didn't really add much to the conversation.
Can you explain how it being designed to inspire greatness is at all relevant to what I said? I'm not seeing it.
it is six times bigger than goal
So the person at the top of a scientific team gets the Nobel, and the people under that person get a solid career prospect and professional satisfaction. Sounds pretty good.
At a company, the upper management gets paid more than the employees.
In government, the president and other politicians get more credit than the career civil service and staffers.
Tom Brady gets more attention and money than his lineman.
I mean... this is how life works, organizations are powerful tools, and individuals get uneven rewards from that. If you want to fix some of the economic or "credit" inequality in science, start with graduate student stipends, not the Nobel. There are some sad cases of people missing out on Nobels, but there are SO FEW ways we in science are recognized by the world at large that I think I speak for all of us when I say it is absolutely worth it.
How is the goal to inspire rather than reward at all relevant to anything I said?
Seems odd that Nobel was involved in the weapons industry all the way up to his death if he had any "guilt" over his achievement being used in war. In fact, there's no documentation that he ever thought his involvement in various peace organizations and weapons development were incompatible. He viewed the armaments made from his invention as deterrents to war even though he was spectacularly wrong as the WWI proved. So he created in his will his foundation, but he didn't do it out of guilt.
So let's just assume that because Dynamite has been used occasionally to kill people, that the invention itself is evil. I take it that you have nothing to do with the construction, demolition, or mining industries where it has been used heavily for very good purposes.
Mod parent up.
Unless GP actually meant the District of Columbia, which is in actuality a separate, and very depraved, den of miscreants, a truly wretched hive of scum and villainy. If someone can bring DC under control, I will fucking personally grant them a Nobel prize of some sort.
The original Nobel prize system was born out of a scientific breakthrough for protecting mine workers from inadvertent explosions.
The breakthrough didn't come from a team, or a geographical mass of people, or a social class, or the general public, etc. It came from Julius Wilbrand. One guy. One dude.
Nobels for science are the only place they make sense. Giving out Nobels for people's political views (like Obama after only being in office for a couple months) has been unequivocally derided.
The only defence against a bad guy with dynamite is a good guy with dynamite.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Yes, inspire is evident in that it is not given to the deceased.
However, they must show significant accomplishment so as to he a good bet. Of course, regression to the mean usually means that's the only truly major accomplishment. That's why guys like Newton and Einstein with multiple major accomplishments stand out like a sore thumb.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
The Nobel foundation has a specific process designed to give awards in the way Mr. Nobel wanted them to be given. His methods won't please everybody. So if you want to reward something different, by all means establish your own prizes!
Or Steve Jobs. Or Mark Zuckerburg. Or Bill Gates. Or...
They can take my dynamite when they pry it out of my cold mangled hands.
Graphene?
Seriously? in as much as I consider discovery of graphene or crystallization of a ribosome a great technological achievements, that's what they are - great technological achievements, nothing more.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Sorry if this veers just a tad off your extremely valid observations, but today - more often than not - the output of all of the remarkable research done by a vast collective of largely under-appreciated and incredibly hard-working people - is then "acquired" by some publishing "agency" that has struck a deal with a university or college and... presto! Work which was often funded by the public purse is suddenly pay-walled and access is denied to all but subscribing academic centres or the extremely wealthy.
I don't think these two things are directly related, but I do think that the overt politicisation of education is analogous to planting fields with land mines instead of crops.
Alfred Nobel invented dynamite. He then created the Nobel Peace Prize to give to people who refrained from using his previous invention.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Yes, he earned that Nobel Prize.
https://youtu.be/8gibAubnNcI
In GOD we trust, all others we monitor.
Thanks for that comment.
Arguments: Peace is HARD. You think it's hard to smack the protons out of a couple atoms? Try getting two tribes of people that have been killing each other for 3 generations to knock it off.
Actually, that's trivial. Just nuke everyone.
Ezekiel 23:20