Tag Archives: Nobel Prizes
Some thoughts on Robert Downey, Jr.’s science funding idea
On December 12, Iron Man, a.k.a. Robert Downey, Jr., and David Lang coauthored an op-ed in Fast Company that announced a grant-giving initiative of theirs designed to help fund scientists doing work too important to wait for the bureaucracy to … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Science
Tagged climate geoengineering, David Lang, fast grants, Footprint Coalition, Iron Man, Katalin Karikó, mRNA vaccines, Nobel Prizes, Robert Downey Jr, Science Engine, science funding
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The great Nobel Prize hypocrisy
Katie Langin’s report for Science on October 12 is an eye-opening account of one reason why the committees that pick every year’s Nobel Prize winners almost never pick women: because they aren’t nominated. Given the Nobel Foundation’s frustrating policy of … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Science
Tagged affirmative action, Anthony Fauci, Göran Hansson, Nobel Prize nominations, Nobel Prizes
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Are major science prizes a form of philanthropy?
The Association for the Advancement of AI conferred its ‘Squirrel AI Award’ on Cynthia Rudin, and Duke University – her employer – published a press release celebrating it. Here’s one para from the release: “Only world-renowned recognitions, such as the … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Science
Tagged AAAI, Bill Gates, Infosys Prizes, Nobel Prizes, philanthropy, scientific prizes, scientific renown, Squirrel AI Award
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The Nobel Prize, its men and climate change
The sciences part of this year’s Nobel Prize announcements have concluded. These are the new laureates: Physics – Syukuro Manabe 🇯🇵 🇺🇸, Klaus Hasselmann 🇩🇪 and Giorgio Parisi 🇮🇹 Chemistry – Benjamin List 🇩🇪 and David W.C. MacMillan 🇬🇧 Medicine/physiology … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Science
Tagged Benjamin List, climate change, David WC MacMillan, fertility discrimination, gender stratification, Nobel Prizes
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Science prizes, wealth location and social signals
One count on which I almost always find myself to be an outlier in India is my opinion that the Nobel Prizes and their derivatives belong in the gutter. But while many people in other countries share this opinion of … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Op-eds, Science
Tagged Arindam Ghosh, Infosys Foundation, Infosys Prizes, Nobel Prizes, Prachi Deshpande, privilege, Rajan Sankaranarayanan, research funding, Social Sciences, SS Bhatnagar Award, Swarnajayanti Fellowships, wealth signalling
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Caste, and science’s notability threshold
A webinar by The Life of Science on the construct of the ‘scientific genius’ just concluded, with Gita Chadha and Shalini Mahadev, a PhD scholar at HCU, as panellists. It was an hour long and I learnt a lot in … Continue reading
Posted in Scicomm, Science
Tagged Brahmins, caste, casteism, constructs, experimental physics, Gita Chadha, Indian journalism, mainstream media, Nobel Prizes, science communication, Shalini Mahadev, sociology of science, upper caste, Western modernity
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Review: ‘Salam – The First ****** Nobel Laureate’ (2018)
Awards are elevated by their winners. For all of the Nobel Prizes’ flaws and shortcomings, they are redeemed by what its laureates choose to do with them. To this end, the Pakistani physicist and activist Abdus Salam (1926-1996) elevates the … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Science
Tagged Abdul Kalam, Abdus Salam, Abdus Salam ICTP, Ahmadiya sect, Benito Mussolini, Enrico Fermi, Nishan-e-Imtiaz, Nobel Prize for physics, Nobel Prizes, Pakistan, religious presecution, Srinivasa Ramanujan, Steven Weinberg, theoretical physics, Zia-ul-Haq, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto
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Two sides of the road and the gutter next to it
I have a mid-October deadline for an essay so obviously when I started reading up on the topic this morning, I ended up on a different part of the web – where I found this: a piece by a journalist … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Op-eds
Tagged bias, Bob Woodward, Donald Trump, ignorance, Jay Rosen, Kary Mullis, Nobel Prizes, objectivity, Omar Kelly, Poynter, Richard Feynman, Surjit Bhalla, Swarajya Mag, The New York Times, victim-blaming, victimisation, view from nowhere, women in STEM
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Why do we cover the Nobel Prize announcements?
The Nobel Prizes are too big to fail. Even if they’ve become beset by a host of problems, such as: Long gap between invention/discovery and recognition, A large cash component given to old scientists, Limiting number of awardees to three, … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Abel Prize, Lasker Award, media coverage, Nobel Committee, Nobel Prizes, science journalism, SS Bhatnagar Award, Wolf Prize, women in STEM
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The notion of the Nobel Prizes
Some points generated during a discussion with a friend: The Nobel Prizes used to be definitive of the orientation of scientific research in the past; however, staying on top of all recognition now is impossible as fields of research have … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged mobilization, Nobel Prizes, recognition, science prize, Yuri Milner
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