Comments on: Is the Physics Nobel Prize Also Becoming a Joke?

By: Rand M.

Rand M. — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 21:53:17 +0000

I couldn’t agree more. Chu has left a long trail of talented students and associates who have left science altogether, sued him, etc. as a result of his tactics. Some have confessed (in an affidavit to a federal district court) to having been manipulated into perjuring themselves to defend him, incontrovertable evidence of obstruction of justice has been found, and any discerning look at his publications will reveal scientific misconduct (data that simply “evolves” over time, getting better with each pass).

Fortunately, enough was known from incidents ca. ’73, ca. ’81-82, and then of the YBCO discovery that the Nobel committee rightfully snubbed him.

By: klein

klein — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 05:48:22 +0000

This years prize is too boring to be controversial. They are really scraping
the bottom of the barrel. Why not give it to the people who had the ideas, at least.

By: Sigfried

Sigfried — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 02:01:00 +0000

The 2010 physics Nobel prize is also going to be controversial.
The experiments which focused everyone’s attention were done by the Geim and Novoselov group at
Manchester and Philip Kim group at Columbia. There is no reason why Kim doesnt deserve a share.
The original idea about why it would be interesting came from Semenoff, who practically invented
the subject, twenty years earlier.

By: RC

RC — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 16:24:52 +0000

One of the reasons Paul Chu didn’t win a Nobel prize was because no one could figure out who among the scientists and students at the Universities of Houston and Alabama-Huntsville (where the event occured) was responsible for the discovery. The University of Houston offered up many stories, few of which have anything in common. Someone should interview the people involved now (given that telling the truth might no longer put a job on the line) and see what they say.

By: Neil Baker

Neil Baker — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 03:46:47 +0000

I was an undergrad in Materials Engineering at the time of the Bednorz and Müller breakthrough and I had coincidentally entered that field of study due to an earlier captivation with the idea of a room temperature superconductor. I remember how embarrassed and confused I was when I witnessed Newsweek give its cover to Paul Chu instead of Bednorz and Müller. Paul Chu’s contribution was to build on the breakthrough of others by organizing his grad students into performing trial and error mixing of various stoichiometric ratios of elements close to that of the original breakthrough mixture to see if higher transition temperatures could be achieved. Chu’s reactive trial and error accomplishment can’t be compared with the incredible causal accomplishment of Bednorz and Müller. It amazes me still today when I think how Bednorz and Müller reached into the infinite to extract that superconductive tertiary ceramic compound. And there’s still no room-temperature superconductor or even a good theory explaining where to search for one despite Chu’s research group at the University of Houston being showered with funding. I think Chu probably represents an attention-grabbing liability exploiting the hard work of others and that the continuing absence of significant research results is the expected outcome of diversion of research funds from real scientists.

By: Bob

Bob — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 22:33:41 +0000

Roentgen was awarded first physic’s Nobel for discovering
x rays in late 1895. My understanding is that Jesuit physics
teacher from what is now St. Ignatius College Prep in Chicago
was x raying peoples hands at Columbian Exposition of 1893. Its
possible that Tesla also beat Roentgen.

By: Gabriel Hanna

Gabriel Hanna — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 02:55:30 +0000

I have to second bbbeard here. It is not right for Dr Tipler to pretend that entire physics community agrees with his criticism of Born by calling his ideas “disproved”.

Feel free to make that case in papers and conferences. When enough of your peers agree with you, then tell people who don’t have the education to judge what you are talking about.

By: bbbeard

bbbeard — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 19:56:12 +0000

Frank:

You know full well that most physicists are (a) aware of the many-world interpretation of QM, and (b) don’t buy it. MWI explains absolutely nothing that the Copenhagen interpretation can’t, and fails any reasonable test of parsimony. The fact that you throw criticism of Born into an otherwise compelling narrative says something about your judgment.

BBB

By: Paul -Indiana

Paul -Indiana — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 16:48:04 +0000

#23. Raj, I’ve been to Oslo in mid summer and it was uncomfortably cool. In the 50′s, in fact. Florence is nice that time of year.

By: Jeffrey

Jeffrey — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 17:37:01 +0000

Nobel Prize = Idiots prize and should be avoided at all cost.
Nobel Prize = Beelzebub prize given to liars, cheats, murderers, racists and all those that hate God.
The prize reminds one of those who are praised by the likes of Castro, Chavez, Putin and the rest of the evil kingdom leaders. We should all worry when the devil and his minions are praising our leaders.