Moorad Alexanian wrote:
> There is only one Noble prize in physics that has anything to do with the
> Big Bang-- Penzias and Wilson 1978--and that was an accidental discovery
> not influenced by theoretical work on the early universe. Of course, our
> interpretation of the radiation being the remnant of the Big Band may change
> in the future. My challenge to those who know the field of physiology or
> medicine, etc. is the following: What Nobel Prize granted in such fields was
> the result of applications of evolutionary theory? I enclose the press
> release of this year's prize in physiology or medicine. Moorad
Nobel Prizes are a shaky indicator of the importance of scientific
work. It could certainly be argued that Gamow should have gotten the physics
prize for his cosmological model that predicted the MWB, but he died before the
blackbody character of the radiation had been demonstrated convincingly. There
is no Nobel Prize in astronomy so there was no possibility for Hubble, e.g., to
get one: Penzias & Wilson were the first to get a prize for work in
astrophysics.
& there are other considerations. There sometimes seems to be a
prejudice against theorists. It's well know that Einstein got the prize
ostensibly for his work on the photoelectric effect, with only a veiled
reference to relativity. Feynman, Schwinger & Tomonaga had to wait ~20 years to
get one, while experimentalists who make significant discoveries sometimes get
the prize within a few years. & political considerations also come in.
Jordan's Nazi sympathies probably didn't help him any & I wonder how much
influence John Wheeler's work on & support for nuclear weapons development has
had to do with his failure to get a Nobel Prize.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Oct 11 2001 - 10:35:10 EDT