Talk:Nobel Prize/Archive 1

Citation for each laureate's selection

I would like to add the citations explaining why each Laureate was selected. I interpret http://www.nobel.se/help/copyright/index.html to mean that these citations would be in the public domain. -- Claudine

Economics not real Nobel Prize

The prize in economics is NOT considered a "real" Nobel Prize, (By whom? - GWO) and this have been emphasized more (By whom?) and more in sweden. Maybe it should be moved under the line to the other "nobel-like" prizes?

GWO - Some of the more notable critics today is the grandchildren of Nobel who claim that 1) the prize of economics is not in the will of Alfred Nobel and 2) Alfred Nobel did not consider economics to be a science i.e. not worthy of a prize. They are currently working for the committee and media to not to shorten the current name to "nobel prize" but to the "Bank of Sweden prize" (whereas the long name is somewhere on the lines of "Bank of Sweden prize in economics in the memory of Alfred Nobel").

It is by the Nobel Commitee, who make no distinction. I say keep it where it is.

Biographies copyrights

Does anyone know if we have permission to copy/paste the biographies from www.nobel.se?

PeterLB 17:54, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

- Guess not: Copyrights on nobel.se
PeterLB 19:26, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Chronological or reverse chronological lists?

Hi, I was just wondering (this is because I was searching for the names of the more recent Nobel laureates) why the lists are placed in chronological order. (Maybe it's just me but) wouldn't it be more convenient of it ran in reverse chronological?

Oh, and the formatting for the different Nobel prizes differ - I think it needs standardization... - Fiveless 13:25, Oct 13, 2004 (UTC)

Pronunciation

Maybe it's just me or where I live... But I've heard Noble pronounced only as no-bell, where there is no discernable accent. The previous entry said no-BELL, which would imply an accent on the second syllabus. I just added my two cents, but I've just never heard of the latter. Both it is, for now. --128.235.130.68 07:10, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The correct pronounctation is no-BELL. While it is a 'noble' prize indeed, the name is spelt 'Nobel' and prounounced that way as well. See the article on Alfred Nobel for a sound file. Swedish, like German, has a long vowel sound when a single consonant follows, which is opposite to english, where a double consonant means a long vowel sound ("tall", "talent"). So indeed 'Nobell' would be a closer for an english speaker.

AxelBoldt: That is just wrong. The Peace prize ceremony is in Oslo, and was in 2002 as well. 2002 laureate Jimmy Carter at Oslo City Hall can be seen here

The peace prize winner recives his prize on Dec 10 in the Oslo City Hall in Oslo, Norway. The rest of the laureates recive their awards at the Stockholm Concert Hall, followed by a banquet at Stockholm City Hall.

Nomination for the Nobel Prize

I am going to edit the line which says that nobel prize nomination is meaningless because anyone can nominate anyone or something to that effect. That is not true. According to the Nobel organizations website there are specifi rules on who may nominate. In digest it says that for each prize category the person doing the nominating must be a distinguised practiioner of the science or art the prize pertains to. This is established by academy membership or professional practice. Details can be found, Nobel Prize for physics nominator qualifications or Nobel Peace Przie nominator qualifications

The information the way I put it in the article was not cut/paste. I put it in my own words therefore no copywright issues need to be considered. --Hfarmer 22:38, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

If the author of the wiki page was using his own words, it looks like someone else plagiarized him.

A practically identical text can be seen at: http://psychcentral.com/mwiki/index.php/Nobel_Prize <quote> It should be noted that the expression "nominated for a Nobel Prize," when used to establish someone's credentials or expertise in a certain field, is not an essentially meaningless expression. Although anyone can be nominated, not anyone can nominate anyone else for a Nobel Prize. </quote> Dude, somebody plagiarized somebody, unless the psychcentral folks gave you credit and I couldn't find the footnote.

Haven't you seen a sign of Wikipedia at the bottom of their page? They have every right to publish text from Wikipedia as long as they do so according to the GNU Free Documentation Licence. --Eleassar777 09:00, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Economics

The official website of the Nobel Prize refers to the economics award as a "Nobel Prize", but also spares no effort to work in the long form:

• The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel [1]
• The Bank of Sweden (Sveriges Riksbank) Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel [2]
• "The Nobel Prize is an international award given yearly since 1901 for achievements in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature and for peace. In 1968, the Bank of Sweden instituted the Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, founder of the Nobel Prize." [3]

Short form:

• This is the official online source where you first learn the names of the new Nobel Prize Winners in October each year. [4]
• The "List of all laureates" [5] makes no distinction between original and Bank of Sweden prizes.

So the question remains: can we call recipients of the Economics award "Nobel Prize winners"? Uncle Ed July 6, 2005 16:13 (UTC)

How many prizes?

• "a total of 770 Nobel Prizes have been given"

Does this include, or exclude, economics? If it includes economics, then I'm changing all the "Sweden" stuff back to "Nobel". If it excludes it, then we have to say:

• "735 Nobel Prizes and 35 Bank of Sweden Prizes" have been given out.

It's one or the other, people. Don't let's get crazy about this. Uncle Ed July 6, 2005 16:30 (UTC)

770 includes economics. --Apoc2400 23:16, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Suggest restructuring

I suggest that:

• About the prizes and Prize categories are merged and made the first section, before Nobel's Will.
• The history part of About the prizes is move into a new History section, placed after Nobel's Will.
• Criticism of the prize is moved to just above Other prizes.

Any objections or can I do it? --Apoc2400 09:51, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I have made a lot of changes now. --Apoc2400 23:14, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Fictional Nobel Prize Recipients

Would it be possible or encouraged for someone to start a list for Fictional Recipients of the Nobel Prize? (This would cover recipients of the Prize in Movies, Novels, Television and Comics). Orville Eastland 23:17, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Certainly not in this article. You're free to start a separate article, but it will be jumped on by a herd of new pages patrollers, so it's best to have relatively organized product before posting it. savidan^{(talk) (e@)} 06:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Declined Prizes?

The opening section states that some prizes have been declined. A list of people that did so would be nice. Matt Deres 02:06, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

There's a list of people who declined the prize on the Nobel Prize controversies page. AndrewWTaylor 15:56, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

What about prizes that were received after initial rejection by the scientific community? Declined papers that won Nobel prizes May be appropriate for external link. Lakinekaki

Errors

I gave the article a once-over. The only major error that jumped out at me (I'm no expert on the Nobel Prizes, I should add), was a mention that Alfred Nobel was shocked by the use of dynamite for war. This is false; he spent many years working to develop military weapons involving explosives, there could have been no shock. It seems more a case to me that he developed weapons of war but was interested, on the whole, in peace (or at least wanted to settle his moral debts). See this article for more information about this aspect of his career. --Fastfission 19:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

I found this to be slightly inaccurate:

Each award can be given to a maximum of three people per year.

At least the peace prize is not necessarily awarded to people but often to organizations. So stating that only 3 people can be given the prize seems inaccurate and could maybe have been counted as an error by the reviewer? Shanes 04:49, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, corporations are "persons" under the law. Perhaps this is true for organizations as well? --Daev 16:01, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

And what about this:

It is customary (but not mandatory) for the recipients to donate the prize money to benefit scientific, cultural or humanitarian causes.

Is this really true? What are the percentage of winners who donate all the money? I have no idea myself, but "customary" looks too strong a word to me. Shanes 05:25, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Customary is definitely the wrong word, it implies that they're expected to do so, which is not true. Which necessitates the "but not mandatory" remark. I'll simply replace this with "It is common", a better word. --BluePlatypus 03:18, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Errors ID'd by Nature, to correct

The results of what exactly Nature suggested should be corrected is out... italicize each bullet point once you make the correction. -- user:zanimum

• “The prize is occasionally awarded to those who preserved through critical moments in a process despite the risk of failure.” Not sure what this is supposed to mean, but if it implies that the committees take this criteria into account when deciding upon who shall get a prize, there is no evidence for this. This is part of the mythology and relates to Nobel’s own romantic vision, but not to the actual working of the prizes.
• The reasoning for why no mathematics prize with respect to mathematics not considered a practical science is historically wrong. We do not know why Nobel chose not to include mathematics; evidence points to issues not mentioned in the entry, which repeats popular mythology and not work of those who studied the issue in detail.
• Final date for receiving proposals is 31 January not 1 February.
• Unclear/misleading: Those invited to nominate is unclear. Process of evaluating is unclear. The discussion of criticisms seems haphazardly slapped together; where useful information was found, it was included, but no clear thesis or vision for what should be included seems present. No perspective on why the prizes became significant; no perspective on general use of NP or other prizes for determining the alleged ‘Best’.
• Omission: The location of the ceremonies has changed over time.

Changing "commendation"?

The text states "widely regarded as the supreme commendation in the world today." However, the commendation article seems to have little relevance for this prize. Would not "award" or "honor" or something similar be better? Meritus 14:48, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Note on Mahatma Gandhi

If the Nobel Prizes are awarded by Sweden, what is the relevance of Norway not wanting to offend its World War II ally, the United Kingdom, to awarding Gandhi the Nobel Prize? Alfred Nobel liked drama and poetry as much as chemistry and physics. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.95.241.122 (talk) 01:50, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Because of this:

The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded annually in Oslo, the capital of Norway, unlike the prizes in economics, physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature, which are awarded in Stockholm, Sweden. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.77.195.21 (talk) 15:56, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Claims of Nomination

Periodically, a Wikipedia article claims that someone has been nominated for a prize -- generally within the 50-year secrecy period. I feel that such claims should either not be included or severely qualified. At least one other editor strongly disagrees. The instant case is R.J. Rummel, but I have placed a request for input on Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Nobel and Other Secret Prize Nominations. Robert A.West (Talk) 06:11, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Declining Nobel

I want to find a list of prize winners that have declined the award. Also with any reason(s) given by them. Is there any such page in Wikipedia?

I believe this is what you are looking for: Nobel Prize controversies. MiraLuka 20:42, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, reason(s) are summarized in the section "Nobel Prize controversies#Nominees and recipients who declined."--NYScholar 14:46, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Yasser Arafat

I modified the comment on Yasser Arafat. Originally it stated

Yasser Arafat for signing a peace agreement with Israel which he proceeded to ignore.

Now it states:

Also among the most infamous is the peace prize awarded to Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin.

Whether Yasser Arafat ignored the peace treaty or was unable to act or was forced to act due to Israels defiance of the peace treaty (after Rabin was assisinated) is hotly disputed and presenting it as a fact is not NPOV. The main controversies article is probably a better guide to a slightly more balanced assessment of Yasser Arafat and Peres relative merit to the peace prize. However it might be better to leave it as is, and let readers visit the main controveries page or the individual pages for the people in question to get a better assessement of whether there people deserved the peace prize or not. In any case, clearly presenting such a hotly disputed issue as fact is not NPOV. Nil Einne 21:58, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

List of unshared prizes?

Would it be worth the effort to make a list of unshared Nobel prizes? It would be rather short, at least in the sciences, since unshared prizes have become a rarity, because nowadays there are so many scientists and so many parallel research efforts, and most of the research is done by teams, not by outstanding individuals. That's why we have seen this recent inflation of Nobel Prize winners... Science History 16:12, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Controversial examples of controversies

There are examples of controversies on the page, which might be okay, but unfortunately the examples cited by Pproctor (talk · contribs) just happens by sheer coincidence to be the lack of recognition of a one Peter Proctor (which he whines about here). Such self-promotion is obviously to be frowned upon, but other Wikipedians' input on the matter are welcome, so if consensus is reached here that it should be included then it should. — Dunc|☺ 10:22, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

An organic polymer voltage-controlled switch from 1974. Now in the Smithsonian

First, you removed references to both of the controversies surrounding exactly who discovered the transistor. Likewise, the fact that high conductivity in Charge transfer complexes was discovered nearly two decades before that in the polyacetylene organic semiconductors. Similarly, these days, the official histories clearly give John McGinness credit for the first organic solid state device. E.g.:

"An Overview of the First Half-Century of Molecular Electronics" by Noel S. Hush, Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 1006: 1–20 (2003).

• "Also in 1974 came the first experimental demonstration of an operating molecular electronic device (emphasis-added) that functions along the lines of the biopolymer conduction ideas of Szent-Gyorgi. This advance was made by McGinness,(and coworkers) who examined conduction through artificial and biological melanin oligomers. They observed semiconductor properties of the organic material and demonstrated strong negative differential resistance, a hallmark of modern advances in molecular electronics.58 Like many early advances, the significance of the results obtained was not fully appreciated until decades later...(p 14)"

206.180.133.30 02:32, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Copyright violations in use of the Nobel medal throughout Wikipedia articles and Wikipedia Commons

See Nobel image talk page. The various image files (.jpg and .png ) used in the Nobel prize articles are not within fair use. The Nobel medal is clearly protected by both trademark and copyright, and it cannot be used without written permission obtained in advance from the Nobel Foundation. [Claims to the contrary on many linked pages throughout Wikipedia and Wikipedia Commons to these images of the Nobel medal (logo) and the images of individual Nobel medals in various fields all seem to be contradicted by the actual copyright notices on the Nobel Foundation Nobel Prize webpages.] --NYScholar 20:58, 1 September 2006 (UTC); updated --NYScholar 08:22, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

These images are "fair use". Note that "fair use" is an exception to copyright and trademark laws that works regardless of the claims or policies of the copyright or trademark holder.

These images, on the other hand, should not be on commons. David.Monniaux 11:47, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

This use is disputed. The logo and images of the Nobel Medal and all Nobel Medals explicitly require written permission being "granted" by the Nobel Foundation for their use in any such articles. See the talk page of the image. The assertion that these images are within "fair use" is disputed, since the copyright registered to the Nobel Foundation requires written permission to be "granted" for their use and for their use "only" in articles about Alfred Nobel, the Nobel Prize, and Nobel Prize laureates prior to their use and that the registered copyright notice to the Nobel Foundation be affixed on their use IF such permission is granted in writing by the Nobel Foundation. See the talk page of the image. --NYScholar 20:43, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I've suggested several times to this user to e-mail the Foundation's legal team about the issue. He has, to my best knowledge, always declined to do so. David.Monniaux 17:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

This user has never suggested that I e-mail the Nobel Foundation's "legal team about the issue." See the Nobel Image talk page and particularly my section called The possible violations of copyright have been brought to the attention of the Nobel Foundation.

There I explained days ago now that the Nobel Foundation ("the Foundation") had already been contacted re: this matter. Early Monday morning, September 4, 2006 (Labor Day in the United States, a national holiday), I received a reply from the copyright contact person in public relations for the Nobel Foundation (from the contact address listed in the copyright notice on the official website for the Nobel Prize), saying that she had referred this matter to the legal department of the Foundation. Responsibility for resolving these potential copyright violations resides with Wikipedia and the Nobel Foundation.

Please also see my current talk page, and follow its link to my Archive 1, for more information, including DM's comment "suggesting" that I contact Wikipedia's "legal use" people (not the Nobel Foundation's "legal team").]

Clearly, as it is his photograph and others' photographs and images relating to and from the Nobel Foundation's website of the trademark and copyrighted design of the Nobel Medal that are uploaded in Wikipedia and posted in this article, it is he and they who need to contact the Nobel Foundation for guidance (and to ask for permission). To avoid potential trademark and copyright infringement, they (not I) need to seek guidance from its legal department re: his and others' claims of "fair use" and various and sundry misstatements about the provenance of the Nobel Medals and the Nobel Foundation's copyright. (The licenses are still erroneously presented throughout Wikipedia; some of the same images have been deleted from Wikipedia Commons, though they are still being featured, in a featured article yet, in some other language versions of Wikipedia, e.g., Czech, with erroneous descriptions and statements.)

Please go to my talk page, archive 1, for the context of what DM actually wrote in my talk page re: e-mail and for my reply there: This is what he wrote:

I believe this image falls under the "fair use" clause of US copyright law for use on articles directly related to the Nobel prize. If you disagree with it, write to legal AT wikimedia DOT org, where your email will be dutifully ignored by our legal staff, which has more serious stuff to do than deal with ridiculous quarrels on copyright. David.Monniaux 11:35, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Despite my reply there and elsewhere (repeatedly) that I do not use the e-mail feature in Wikipedia or engage in e-mail with Wikipedia because of my own (understandable) concerns about privacy, DM later posted his misleading comment (out of context) above in this article talk page and not on his own image page, where I have already explained that I don't use e-mail in Wikipedia and that I do not wish to do so.

Faulty statements about the policies of the Nobel Foundation regarding its logo, design of the Nobel Medal, images, and photographs of its Nobel Medal are now posted and re-posted throughout Wikipedia and other online sites now displaying Creative Commons and GNU licenses for this article or earlier versions of it. The Nobel Medal images and photographs and Nobel Medal trademark logo and Nobel Medal designs are not licensed freely for "any use" as claimed; that claim (in some of these featured Wikipedia uploaded images) totally distorts the very trademark and copyright policies stated in the copyright notices posted on the website of the Nobel Foundation (as already linked multiple times and quoted in these various talk pages).

As I explain in my archived talk page, I have neither the time nor the inclination to deal with these issues about his and others' uploading of trademark and copyright-protected images of the Nobel Medals any further. My earlier comments in this talk page, my comments in the Wikipedia talk pages of the various uploaded images, and my comments in my own archived talk page should suffice. Please read them in the context of the entire dispute about copyright and Fair use pertaining to Wikipedia's featuring images of Nobel Medals in this and other articles in English and in other languages (See also the second tag at the top of this page for an example of such problems).

Fortunately, at least in this "Nobel Prize" article someone has finally added the registered copyright identifying the Nobel Foundation as the owner of the trademarked Nobel Medal design and copyright ("Original design ®© The Nobel Foundation"). But, unfortunately, permission has not yet been requested or received for featuring the notices (my last information from the Nobel Foundation). But the featuring of the just-quoted credit (throughout this article on the "Nobel Prize") appears to me to suggest that such permission was already granted. That suggestion is misleading, because various claims of "fair use" (of the Nobel Medal images) are still (in my own view) in some doubt. The image pages uploaded by various Wikipedians, however, do not clearly state the current situation.

For comparison, one may wish to consult the featuring of images of the medals in the article on "Nobel Prize" in the Online Encyclopedia Britannica. It's not entirely clear to me whether permission was requested and granted for these (degraded resolution) images (or whether, as in, say, DM's case, there are simply assumptions of "fair use" being made w/o such written requests/permission granted in writing), but the Encyclopedia Britannica articles display a credit to "The Nobel Foundation," suggesting that it was.

The general statement about "copyright" and "trademarks" in "legal notices" of that online encyclopedia ("Photographs and illustrations are copyrighted by their respective owners, as noted in the credits") suggests that such permission from copyright owners is sought and attained if and as deemed necessary; see also the section on "trademarks" there.

The images of Nobel Medals in this Wikipedia article at least now feature the proper symbols re: the "design" of the Nobel Medal in a more consistently elegant and accurate (in my view) manner, following precisely the format that the Nobel Foundation asks when it does grant permission. So maybe the Nobel Foundation will okay these if the images' description/license pages are revised also to represent the NF's trademark/copyright more accurately and more consistently throughout Wikipedia, in all its language versions. --NYScholar 09:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Mathematics prize

In the section on lack of a mathematics prize, we say: "Like the science Nobels, the Crafoord Prize in mathematics is awarded by the Swedish Royal Academy. It is generally considered the mathematics equivalent of the Nobel prize in the sciences." My feeling is that in mathematics the Fields Medal is considered the equivalent of the Nobel Prize. --Jordan

This 2001 press release issued by the Swedish Royal Academy about Alain Connes (who won both the Crafoord Prize [2001] and the Fields Medal [1983]) agrees that the Fields Medal is the most prestigious award in Mathematics. See its similar phrasing: "He received the Fields Medal in 1983 (the most highly regarded mathematical prize in the world)"; cf. Wikipedia article: "The Fields Medal is widely viewed to be the top honor a mathematician can receive.[1]" Maybe the passage could add (for e.g.) the qualification: ". . .; however, the Fields Medal is generally considered the mathematics equivalent of the Nobel Prize in the sciences." --NYScholar 14:43, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The Fields Medal can impossibly be considered the top honor mathematics award since there is an age limit on the winner. A prize excluding the majority (age 40+) of the research community can not be considered a serious equivalent of the Nobel Prize. (These days you need a lot of knowledge to do quality research, so it's not even the case that young researchers are "better" - i.e. performing research with higher quality - than old ones. Rather the contrary.) // Jens Persson (130.242.128.85 18:25, 18 September 2006 (UTC))

I thought that mathematicians generally felt they do their best work when young. -- Beardo 17:13, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The Field prize is the highest regarded math award, second if is the Wolf prize (with no age limit) and everything else comes after that, possibly with the Clay Millenium problems as third. 195.70.48.242 09:23, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Other prizes

That section really doesn't belong here in such details. Much better to have a separate article on say "International prizes" ? -- Beardo 19:36, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

The section is intended to show similar awards related to the Nobel Prize, it's not a list of international prizes. Since Wikipedia has the list of prizes, medals, and awards, a separate article is completely unnecessary. —Coat of Arms (talk) 22:08, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Jews Overrepresented

Perhaps it should be mentioned in this article that, despite their very small number in proportion to the general World population, Jews are highly overrepresented when it comes to Nobel Prizes received. So, this leads me to ask: is it a prerequisite that a person must be Jewish to win a Nobel Prize? --64.12.116.130 03:09, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Or is it just that Jews are cleverer than the rest of us ? -- Beardo 17:13, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

This is impossible because it would mean the nazi race theory is true, that is some colours of people are genetically superior to the rest! The truth is jews, who lived mainly in Europe and North Africa during the entire Medieval Age and Early Modern Age, were banned by christian kings from owning land or doing agriculture. So they had to find occupation with manufacture, trade or fiscals to sustain themselves and that requires more intellectual skills. So they developed a culture that praised learning, especially the practically useful subjects. Even in the late 19th century, central european jewish youth were most likely to attend medical or natural sciences university, while young "christian" nobleman and bourgeois were more interested about degrees from law or state bureaucracy faculties. There was a period of 15 years near 1900 when the Budapest, Hungary jewish communty produced half a dozen top scientists (Nobel laurates and other big heads like John von Neumann). 195.70.48.242 09:10, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I would like to see some figures on this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] ([[User talk:{{{1}}}|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/{{{1}}}|contribs]])

The previous comment is unsigned. As it suggests, the previous anonymous user posted this section with nothing to back it up. Such a comment has no place in this article, in my view. The concept of "overrepresentation" leans away from WP:NPOV and appears to be an inappropriate (potentially pejorative) judgment masquerading as fact. No facts have been presented by the anonymous user; the user's observation requires citation of a reliable source: see WP:Reliable sources. A possible attempt to raise controversy by an anonymous poster is not the same as a citation of a reliable source contributing to development of NPOV in writing an article. As many Nobel Laureates are still living people, WP:BLP applies in relation to this article too. Comments on their religious identification (not part of the criteria for their choice as Nobel Laureates)potentially violates BLP policy. According to the selections committees for the various Nobel prizes, such prizes are awarded on the basis of "merit" in their recipients' fields. Their religious identification (if even known) has nothing to do with their choice as recipients. The idea of a "prerequisite" appears to be facetious and is not to be taken seriously. It appears to be a ruse to start a controversy. I say ignore the post (which is objectionable) and this subject. --NYScholar 20:09, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

<<Their religious identification (if even known) has nothing to do with their choice as recipients.>> [NYScholar]

Sorrowfully this is not true. One of the undeniable inventors of MRI was controversially excluded from the Nobel award, obviously based on his publicly visible seven-day creationist beliefs. Although creationism is fundamentalist junk that is clearly not up to scratch when compared to darwinism, one's personal beliefs about the supernatural and His revelations must never ban anybody from recognition for good sci-tech he/she did. 195.70.48.242

See what happens when we let Jews in to universities? We get things like atomic bombs, feminism, and American Studies. Jews are grossly over-represented when it comes to winning them - they have won about 18% of Nobel Prizes I believe, despite making up less than 0.25% of the World's population. --172.164.89.46 22:53, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

By the way: 27% of American Nobelists are Jewish, despite being only 2% of the US population. --172.164.89.46 23:05, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

For some historical contexts for potentially-veiled implications in comments by the anonymous posters above, see the Wikipedia article on Anti-Semitism and W:Guidelines and policies pertaining to offensive speech acts in articles and talk pages. Anonymous users who may be (or not be) trolls tend not to read or follow these policies and guidelines. -NYScholar 03:51, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

American servitude?

Is there a political agenda behind this year's full-american awarding of the medals? Does Dubya control the swedish academy? I'm afraid the prestiege of Nobel medals will drop sharply if the selection is indeed proven biased. Considering how little hard sci education is going on in America nowadays compared to India, Japan or even China plus the seven-day sectarian scandals, these full-american awards could be seen as a cover-up. So Bush can hide America's new Sputnik problem. 195.70.48.242 09:15, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

American Excellence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] ([[User talk:{{{1}}}|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/{{{1}}}|contribs]])

October 12, 2006: The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2006 has been awarded to Orhan Pamuk, who is Turkish, not an American. On October 13, 2005, last year's Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Harold Pinter, who is English, and Pamuk was widely thought to be a candidate for it prior to that. Some of the remarks in this section and earlier ones making irrelevant statements about nationality and religious affiliations of Nobel Laureates seem inappropriate; they do not follow WP:NPOV. --NYScholar 03:42, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Neither literature of those (literature and peace award) are sciences. One is art and the other is politics, which are not objective and thus those are insignificant. The fact is, Nobel Committe is part of a cover-up trying to hide America's growing education quality problem by awarding all science medals this year to people in the USA. If the public woke up and made note of this scandal, USA would actually benefit. In 25 years American science and industry will depend on China and India for even the simplest things, as the Bushite posse forces kids to learn seventh day jesus horse dinosaurs and how condoms are bad. Flat Earth curriculum is not far away in USA and the Nobel Committe is soliciting help for that crime. 195.70.48.242 08:02, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Where is the evidence for this bizarre claim? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 89.172.17.219 (talk) 16:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC).

For some historical contexts for potentially-veiled implications in some of the above comments by the anonymous posters, see the Wikipedia article on Anti-Semitism and W:Guidelines and policies pertaining to offensive speech acts in articles and talk pages. Anonymous users who may be (or not be) trolls tend not to read or follow these policies and guidelines. -NYScholar 03:58, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Anonymous users

Before commenting in Wikipedia article talk pages regarding articles like those on Nobel Prizes presented to currently living persons, which must follow WP:BLP, please scroll up to

As directed above, please respect Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines; e.g., WP:TPG. Thank you. --NYScholar 03:58, 13 October 2006 (UTC)\

"Winner" vs "Laureate"

Nobel prizes cannot be won, they are awarded by the respective institutions to recipients, called laureates. "Nobel prize winner" implies a competition where none is intended, neither by Nobel himself, nor by the awarding institutions --- and only in very few cases by the recipients. The article should be edited to reflect this, hmm?

Jussi Karlgren 17:32, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

The Nobel Prize website [6] refers several times to the Laureates ans Winners. I think this would be the definite reference for this type of thing; if they are going to call the Laureates winners, then I think that is what they should be callet --Oshin 13:18, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Ga on hold

Wow sorry i missed this one, generally i tend to nominees waiting along time asap.

• Medal images need fair use rationale
• Prize categories should be moved down to similar prizes
• he Templeton Prize is the largest financial annual prize award given to a single person for intellectual merit, worth 795,000 pounds sterling or 1.4 million US dollars in 2006. Reference please
• Notable Laureates is just a list, try turn it into paragraphs
• Lag in the timing of Nobel Prize recognition for achievements, has three paragraphs that are too short.
• There are a lot of short/one sentence paragraphs, remove, merge or expand
• Process of nomination and selection, instead of listing try write it out
• When you quote him in the box you will need a reference
• Award ceremonies has no references, if a reference is added to each paragraph it will improve its chances on becoming an FA greatly, and a few are required for GA. Also try to incorperate history of the medals into this section as the lead should be a quick summary of the whole article.

All references are properly formatted (A first for me) Basically a few more references need to be added and the above issues dealt with. I will give you seven days and i suggest you get a peer-review in that time, goodluck M3tal H3ad 02:32, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Failed. M3tal H3ad 01:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The article says that eight fathers and sons have received Nobel Prizes. However, in that list Manne Siegbahn and Kai Siegbahn are not present. That should make it ten. They both received the physics prize.

"Black" and "Hispanics" in science?

Has there been any black (and Hispanic) recipient of the Nobel Prize, excluding the intentionally made political-correct Peace Prize and Literature Prize??

Merge The Nobel Banquet

I would like to merge The Nobel Banquet to this article. Any objections? --Selket ^Talk 19:40, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree Superhelix 11:47 1st March

What?

is it handen out in Oslo or Stockholm or what?? ' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.238.11.48 (talk) 20:34, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Quote from the article:

With the exception of the peace prize, which is handed out in Oslo, they are all handed out in Stockholm at an annual ceremony on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death.

/ Mats Halldin (talk) 05:33, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

No Economics Nobel Prize

With due respect to the study of Economics, I do not see any reason why it should continue to claim a Nobel Prize.

Out of respect for the Will of Nobel the Swedish Central Bank should cease spending the Swedish taxpayers' money on what amounts to the commercial offence of 'passing off', that is, pretending Nobel left money for a prize in economics when he did not.

After all. what would people think if a Prize for Astrology in memory of Alfred Nobel was set up ? To be awarded each year by a panel of astrologers with a gold medal and using the funds provided by yet another unfortunate set of taxpayers?

Finally I suggest that wikipedia consider deleting the economics references from the Nobel Prize article. Wikipedia should not encourage the offence of passing off.

Seantmchugh 10:58, 22 May 2007 (UTC)seantmchugh@yahoo.co.uk 22.05.07

Well, unfortunately with Wikipedia we have to write an encyclopedia about the world we have and not the world we wish we had. We're not going to pretend the economics prize doesn't exist because some people don't like it. We will, however, cover the controversy -- there's a section on the controversy at Nobel Prize in Economics. --JayHenry 13:29, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, but the problem is that it is a factual error to claim that the economic prize is a noble prize. Thus it shouldn't be named as such. it is better that it should stand something like :

"The Nobel Prizes (Swedish: Nobelpriset) are awards in Physics, Chemistry, Literature, Peace, Physiology or Medicine. The prize in economy isn't a nobelprize, but a prize that ..." 87.96.132.194 16:17, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I change the factual error on the economic prize, now it clearly state that this is not a nobel prize but something else. But I think that the change made the text a bit weird, so it would be nice if someone checked the flow and the grammar of the change. 87.96.132.194 16:28, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Weird it still reads wrong. Technically, it is not a Nobel prize in the same way that the 4 in the will are. It is really important that this is made clear. Really, really important. There were (and are) political motives in the making of the Memorial Prize for Economics. No mention of this made either. Enough to make you paranoid.58.107.79.77 12:30, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Question

What are the prerequisites to be put on the different committees and how are they chosen to be on them? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Slowcheetah11 (talk • contribs) 15:05, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

NNpov

Perhaps the most infamous case of this was in 1994 when Yassir Arafat shared the Peace Prize with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin for signing the Oslo Accords, despite Arafat's continued support for terrorist attacks against Israel. Arafat later reneged on his commitments under the Oslo Accords. Another example is Rigoberta Menchú, the Guatemalan author who won the Nobel Peace Prize for I, Rigoberta Menchu, which was purported to be an autobiography. As later research found, however, Menchu changed significant amounts of her life story to serve the propaganda needs of the Marxist guerillas then fighting to overthrow the Guatemalan government.

This passage seems highly NNpov and unbalanced to me: besides a clearly non encyclopedic language (the most infamous case, serve the propaganda...), it presents an unbalanced interpretation on disputed facts: many blame Israel politics for the failure of Oslo Accords, something like ... despite Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin continuous violations of human rights in Gaza Strip and West Bank... would have the same right to stay here as the presently expressed point of view (namely, none); the passage on Rigoberta Menchú completely lacks references and indirectly gives a judgment on historical facts which by no means can be said unanimous.

If the aim is to report a discussion around some Nobel Prizes, an encyclopedia should report where this discussions has arisen, which arguments are involved and who supports them, not an argument as a matter of fact itself. I strongly advise to change the whole passage into a more balanced one. --216.16.237.110 13:57, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

You may be misunderstanding the section - it's supposed to be a brief summary of a separate article - Nobel Prize controversies:

• If you think there are no (newsworthy) controversies related to the Nobel prizes, then you should propose deletion of that separate article (not here, but following normal deletion processes).

• If you believe that the section isn't a good summary of the separate article, you should edit it so that it more closely matches the separate article.

• If the section is in fact a reasonable summary of that separate article, then you need to review that separate article for NPOV violations, lack of sources, etc., and if you find problems, make changes or raise questions on the talk page there. If/when that article changes, then the summary here should also change. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:55, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

I gave a glimpse to the separate article and it doesn't seem so unbalanced as the summary, so I guess the second point is the one that fits my remark. However, my mother tongue is not English, so I don't feel as making my own contribution; I just replaced the passage with an excerpt of the separate article, perhaps someone can improve it. --216.16.237.110 16:49, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

List of atheist Nobel laureates

I have created the List of atheist Nobel laureates. In the Wikipedia, there are lists like ‘List of Jewish Nobel laureates’, ‘List of Hindu Nobel laureates’, etc. It is very important to acknowledge that there are several atheists who have received the Nobel Prize. RS

RFC: Country data in Nobel lists

There is currently a Request for Comments about the country data in the Nobel lists at Talk:Nobel Prize in Chemistry#RFC: Country data in Nobel lists. Your comments would be appreciated. The results of the RFC may affect all of the Nobel Prize articles. panda 17:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)