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Scientifically Speaking | The Nobel Prize dilemma: Evolving science, static awards

ByAnirban Mahapatra
Oct 14, 2024 08:00 AM IST

The Nobel Prize finds itself at a crossroads, with questions about the evolving definitions of scientific disciplines and the relevance of clear-cut categories.

Back when X was Twitter and not the mess it is today, there were vibrant and often fiery debates. One such recurring debate was whether Chemistry Nobel Prizes were even chemistry, or whether chemistry had surrendered to biology.

(FILES) This file photo taken on December 10, 2022, shows a plaque showing Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor, businessman, and philanthropist Alfred Nobel (1833-1896) on the podium during preparations ahead of the Nobel Prize award ceremony for literature, science and economy at the Concert Hall in Stockholm, Sweden. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)(AFP) PREMIUM
(FILES) This file photo taken on December 10, 2022, shows a plaque showing Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor, businessman, and philanthropist Alfred Nobel (1833-1896) on the podium during preparations ahead of the Nobel Prize award ceremony for literature, science and economy at the Concert Hall in Stockholm, Sweden. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)(AFP)

On one side were the physical, organic, and inorganic chemists, who often saw themselves as the gatekeepers of the discipline. On the other, the renegades: biochemists, chemical biologists, and other hybrids like us who blurred the lines. We were the folks who, when asked by chemists, loved to talk about biology, and when asked by biologists, we’d switch to chemistry.

Fast forward to this year’s Nobel Prize announcements, and the debate has resurfaced.

In a piece for this newspaper, I wrote about the AI-driven prediction of protein structures that won half of the chemistry Nobel three years ago. That’s a short span of time from discovery to prize, especially when it can take decades for a discovery to be recognised by the Nobel committee.

One-half of this year’s chemistry award went to David Baker from the University of Washington in the US for developing computational tools that let us design proteins with novel shapes and functions. Again, this is a monumental discovery since proteins are the machines that make life possible. Baker’s discovery opens up the world of proteins from scratch, well almost. As Carl Sagan once said, “If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”

But the questions always linger about two of the most revered prizes. What is physics? What is chemistry? And, does it even matter?

Well, yes and no. What you study often delineates your area of expertise. This was painfully obvious during the Covid-19 pandemic. Epidemiologists waded into virology and vice versa, often leading to wild extrapolations and incorrect conclusions. Public health experts extended their reach into areas outside their expertise such as economic policy (and vice versa), leaving the public confused and uncertain about who to trust. Even some Nobel laureates added to the noise, speaking authoritatively on topics where their knowledge was shaky at best.

As for the careers of the scientists themselves, discipline distinctions determine funding decisions, faculty positions, and public recognition. Researchers publish in scientific journals that align with their formal discipline and attend conferences where they rub shoulders with others in their field.

As someone who spent over 15 years as a biologist working at the world’s largest chemical society, I know a thing or two about this. My team and I conceptualised and helped to create scientific journals in blurry fields like synthetic biology, infectious disease drug discovery, and chemical neuroscience, often drawing the ire of online traditionalists who thought we were pushing boundaries too far.

Which brings us back to the Nobel Prizes. They’re bending and twisting to stay relevant.

As Geoffrey Hinton, one of this year’s Physics Nobel recipients pointed out in an interview with The New York Times, the actual idea driving much of AI today, backpropagation, isn’t related to the physics concept that helped him win the prize.

Backpropagation, a method used to train neural networks, revolutionised AI by allowing models to learn from their mistakes and improve iteratively. It’s been crucial to developing the AI systems we rely on today. Hinton himself acknowledged that the Boltzmann machine, the physics-based model that earned him the Nobel, was more like an enzyme in that it helped overcome an initial hurdle, but once we figured out how to train neural networks using backpropagation, it was no longer needed.

There was just one problem. There was no way for the Nobel committee to consider backpropagation in physics, chemistry, or any of their awarded disciplines.

And this raises a larger issue. While there are other prestigious awards like the Turing Award, often dubbed the "Nobel Prize of Computer Science," and the Fields Medal in mathematics, none of them have the same cultural weight as the Nobel Prize. The Nobel carries an aura all its own, both in the public eye and within professional circles.

Hinton, for example, notes that his Nobel win will make people take his warnings about the dangers of AI more seriously. The public perception of the Nobel lends gravitas that no other prize can match.

So, do the Nobel Prizes matter? Yes, they do, because they reward major advances and confer broader legitimacy. But most researchers who work on the cutting edge will never win one. As we face increasingly complex challenges like climate change, pandemics, and AI, we need to recognise that scientific fields that defy easy categorisation are more important than they were when Alfred Nobel conceived these awards.

Anirban Mahapatra is a scientist and author, most recently of the popular science book, When The Drugs Don’t Work: The Hidden Pandemic That Could End Medicine. The views expressed are personal.

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