How did a computer scientist such as Geoffrey Hinton manage to win a Nobel Prize in physics when computer science already has its own Nobel Prize equivalent in the Turing Awards?
Last Updated: 24.06.2025 00:01
"Naah, Linnainmaa is a Finn. Can't give it to a bloody Finnish mathematician. Let's go for drinks. Brännvin anyone?"
Whatever.
"Hey guys, AI is pretty big so let's centre our prizes on it this year. We can get some attention, and it's all about advertising, at the end of the day, isn't it?"
Do you prefer wired headphones or wireless earbuds?
[Older voice] "Mmm. What about Hinton, he's widely regarded? Nobody got fired for buying IBM"
"Good point, I'm sure we can swing it. And let's tack on Hopfield while we're about it."
They then move on to selectively provide their own version of history. But hey, it’s OK. They wanted controversy, didn’t they? Whatever.
Apple’s latest AirPods Pro with USB-C just received a $70 discount - The Verge
When he's standing, in front of you
… then anything is possible. There’s no rule that a Nobel Prize has to make sense.^*
[Younger voice] "But wait a minute, Ising-Lenz goes back to the 1920's. And didn't Hinton plagiarise rather a lot? He also didn't invent modern backprop, did he, that's Linnainmaa? And Amari preceded Hopfield, too. That's not a good look."
"Didn't he do something with Boltzmann in it? That sounds physics-y. RBMs and stuff, eh?"
^† They rationalise their decision thusly:
Why wait any longer for the one you love?
Pure Orwell: Europe condemns Iran for attacks on its own territory - Responsible Statecraft
A fly on the wall at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
There you go.^†
[The basic structure of artificial neural networks] has close similarities with spin models in statistical physics applied to magnetism or alloy theory. This year’s Nobel Prize in Physics recognizes research exploiting this connection to make breakthrough methodological advances in the field of ANN.
My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.
(Mumbles of assent)
In December 1973, when Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, comedian Tom Lehrer dropped his mic and stamped on it—satire had just died.
^* Fibiger got the 1926 Medicine prize for the discovery of Spiroptera carcinoma (Don’t ask).
Why wait any longer for the world to begin?
Whatever.
'Call of Duty: Black Ops 7' to Star Milo Ventimiglia, Kiernan Shipka - Variety
You can have your cake and eat it too
(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)
In awarding prizes, the Nobel Committees often seem only marginally more competent than MTG is at explaining meteorology. And if they can give a literature prize for lyrics like:
"Where can we shoehorn it in? Chemistry is easy 'cos AlphaFold; but what about physics? A bit more challenging, right?"
"Good idea, but how can we wangle something that says 'Physics'?"
Fortunately, we are privy to the discussion that led up to this:
Defense Department signs OpenAI for $200 million 'frontier AI' pilot project - theregister.com