The Role of Prizes in Reinforcing Science-Math Bureaucracies
- From: "OsherD" <mdoctorow@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 18 Apr 2005 22:39:44 -0700
>>From Osher Doctorow
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
The Role of Prizes in Reinforcing Physics-Math Bureaucracies
Copyright By Owner Osher Doctorow Ph.D.
First Published 2005
The Nobel Prize and the Fields Medal and Wolf Prize (the latter two in
Mathematics, the former excludes Math but includes Physics, excludes
Psychology but includes Economics) have mixed histories of benefit and
harmfulness in regard to Physics and Mathematics Bureaucracies. On the
one hand, they have encouraged competition and have indeed had
surprising accuracy in finding real Creative Geniuses although my
estimate is that the awarders haven't the faintest clue where to look
for at least 50% of Creative Geniuses (they might have to look in the
"trash bin", which is close to where they would have found Mozart,
Beethoven, etc.). On the other hand, Material Rewards and
Knowledge/Discovery don't really cohere in a fundamental sense. You
can value concrete objects like money, buildings, sex objects, DVDs,
TVs, or you can value abstract objects like ideas and inventions, but
concrete and abstract aren't the same thing and keeping them roughly
balanced at 50% raises the question of why they should be so balanced.
I think that the Abstract and the Concrete should be roughly balanced
in daily life because going overboard on one or the other in
exploration of ideas leads to divorce from Reality including past and
present and future Reality which contains history and Hope, but - and
this is a big qualification - both the fundamentals and the rewards and
the goals of physics and mathematics are Knowledge and nothing but
Knowledge, though the topic of Knowledge can and should have
relationships to Reality.
In looking at the Nobel and Wolf and Fields awards, I find that in
addition to their surprising accuracy in finding perhaps somewhere less
than 50% of the Creative Geniuses in these fields, they play a
remarkable role in preserving Fads and the Status Quo. In this
respect, the Clay Prize of the Clay Mathematics Institute (CMI) of
Cambridge Massachussetts may be somewhat better. Its Science Advisory
Board is chosen presently from Imperial College U.K., Yale, MIT,
Harvard, Princeton, though I'm not sure whether its inclusion of Edward
Witten is an advantage or disadvantage. Instead of the usual obession
with algebraic geometry and algebraic topology, its last 5-6 years have
been noteworthy for awards in dynamic systems/differential equations,
analysis, number theory (including Andrew Wiles, who was passed over by
the Big Boys elsewhere although they "recognized him", whatever that
means), probability, geometry. They did choose Witten in 2001 (who is
into algebraic topology and algebraic geometry) and Alain Connes was
chosen in 2000 with one foot in geometry and physics and another foot
in operator algebras.
This thread doesn't specifically address the Nobel Peace Prize and the
Nobel Prize for Literature, although there is an interesting symptom of
Bureaucracy there. Those prizes are almost completely politicized,
with Peace worse than Literature. They appear to have been awarded for
Cold Wars, Hot Wars, Good Acting (terrorists pretending to be
peacemakers), Social Movements, Fads, and even Stereotypes.
Ultimately, I think that Elitists including several
sci.physics.research and sci.math.research people point to Nobel,
Fields, Wolf, and other types of awards (I think there's even a Fox
award, if I don't have my animals mixed up) as indicators of trends or
directions that "should" be followed as justification for excluding
postings by some Non-Elitists. In Academia and Politics and even the
Military, people point to awards, medals, recognitions to justify
Mediocrity and Ingenious Imitation, although sometimes especially in
the Military (not so much Academia) real merit slips through.
I have to admit that it took me about 45 years of my life before I
began stopping to look for Material rewards, and I still look with some
envy at Rolls Royces, but I eventually found that it really takes
minimal Material reward or even recognition to justify discovery and
Knowledge and Creative Genius. That type of fact has been actually
used by some Dictators/Tyrants to squeeze Creative Genius out of
scientists and mathematicians who have almost no power. Other
Dictators have given small perks to scientists and mathematicians that
other people don't get, but I'd wager a non-monetary bet that it's more
the recognition and not starving to death that motivates the awardees -
and they don't even usually like the people who're awarding them :>)
Osher Doctorow
.
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