The Nobel Prizes are given every October in Sweden and Norway to those who have most benefited mankind in one of six fields: peace, literature, medicine, physics, chemistry, and economics. For each prize, 10 million Swedish kronas (equal to US $1,115,811.10 or 58 talents of silver) is split among the winners. It generally favours White men from Europe and North America.
The winners for 2020:
Medicine or Physiology:
Michael Houghton, Harvey Alter and Charles Rice for the discovery of the Hepatitis C virus, saving millions of lives. Hepatitis C used to spread through blood transfusions, leading to liver cancer and then liver transplants. They found the cause, making it possible for it to be screened out and cured. But even today, 70 million have Hepatitis C, killing about 400,000 a year worldwide.
Physics:
Sir Roger Penrose, Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez for their work on black holes. Penrose gets half the prize money for showing how black holes are a natural consequence of Einstein’s theories. Ghenzel and Ghez found evidence of Sagittarius A*, a huge black hole between Sagittarius and Scorpio at the centre of the galaxy. Ghez, along with Marie Curie, is one of only four women ever to receive a Nobel Prize in Physics. As a girl she wanted to be an astronaut.
Chemistry:
Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna for CRISPR, a gene-editing tool. They met at a cafe in Puerto Rico in 2011 and together turned the anti-virus tacrRNA of Streptococcus pyogenes discovered by Charpentier into something scientists could use to easily edit any piece of DNA. A foundational technology of the 21st century.
Literature:
Louise Glück (sounds like Glick) for “her unmistakable poetic voice, that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal”. Now in her seventies, she is a former US poet laureate (2003-04) and Pulitzer Prize winner (1993). The Nobel committee particularly liked “Averno” (2006), which it called a “masterly collection, a visionary interpretation of the myth of Persephone’s descent into Hell in the captivity of Hades, the god of death”. Her poetry is big on death, childhood, and family life.
Peace:
The WFP, the UN World Food Programme, for acting “as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict”, demonstrating “an impressive ability to intensify its efforts” in the face of the pandemic. They feed 100 million a year. They have never won before.
Economics:
Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson for auction theory, which has “benefitted sellers, buyers and taxpayers” worldwide. Catriona Watson of Rethinking Economics, a charity, notes:
“The Nobel Prize as a marker of excellence in the field needs to become reflective of our global community and address the most pressing issues of our time like the climate crisis, the pandemic or structural racial injustice – otherwise it risks becoming increasingly irrelevant.”
Winners listed by country of birth:
- France: Charpentier.
- Germany: Genzel.
- Italy: WFP (headquartered in Rome).
- UK: Houghton, Penrose.
- US: Rice, Doudna, Milgrom, Wilson
- New York City: Alter, Ghez, Glück.
by county of immigration:
- Canada: Houghton.
by gender:
- male: 7
- female: 4
– Abagond, 2020.
See also:
- Twitter: @NobelPrize
- nobelprize.org
- Nobel Prizes past:
- Nobel Prize winners for 2019
- Nobel Prize winners for 2018 – the last time a woman won a Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Nobel Prize winners for 2017
- Nobel Prize winners for 2016
- Nobel Prize winners for 2015
- Nobel Prize winners for 2008
- Nobel Prize winners for 2007
- Posts on individual Nobel Prize winners:
- Tagore – Literature, 1913
- Fritz Haber – Chemistry, 1918
- Einstein – Physics, 1921
- Jane Addams – Peace, 1931
- Winston Churchill – Literature, 1953
- Martin Luther King, Jr – Peace, 1964
- Solzhenitsyn – Literature, 1970
- Kissinger – Peace, 1973
- Aung San Suu Kyi – Peace, 1991
- Toni Morrison – Literature, 1993
- Nelson Mandela – Peace, 1993
- United Nations – Peace, 2001
- Barack Obama – Peace, 2009
- US dollar
- Attic units – talents and such
- science
- The pandemic
604
Added the Chemistry Prize.
LikeLike
Added the Literature Prize.
LikeLike
“The Nobel Prizes are given every year in October to those who have most benefited mankind in one of six fields: peace, literature, medicine, physics, chemistry, and economics. For each prize, 10 million Swedish kronas (equal to US $1,115,811.10 or 58 talents of silver) is split among the winners.”
“The prizes are widely regarded as the most prestigious awards available in their respective fields.”
To me this yet another bastion of white racism ,that you and most other black people continue to cooperate with thus ensuring our continued position of subordination and subservience.
Just like your and most other black people continued allegiance to Hollywood ,wall street ,Washington and silicon valley.
“The Nobel Prizes are given every year in October to those who have most benefited mankind”
quite pathiec at this point ,I guess its completely unnecessary and trivial to point out
the racist sexist culture of north european white people can’t come up with a word the refers to and includes both genders ,huh.
maybe its because
“in one of six fields: peace, literature, medicine, physics, chemistry, and economics. ”
what’s missing – psychology and sociology ,the two areas that could objectively inform why the most “prestigious awards” in science are centered in a northern european country in which most all the “winners” are white males and the non scientific “peace” prize is the only “prize” given to non white non male people.
why there is no noun inclusive of both genders?
what and why are north european white people racist against every other group of humans ,successfully?
etc etc
LikeLike
Added the Peace Prize.
LikeLike
@ Mbeti
I agree: the Nobel Prize is racist and sexist, embarrassingly so, though in the past few years they seem to be less sexist than they used to be. That means this has become a cringey sort of post that I do every year. But my reasoning is that if something merits a Nobel Prize it is probably worth knowing about, even if there are some duds, like Swedish novelists or Henry Kissinger.
LikeLike
Added the Economics Prize.
LikeLike