The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2024 Monday 7th October 2024 News coverage: The Guardian: Nobel prize in medicine awarded to scientists for work on microRNA Nicola Davis The New York...
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2024
Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun “for the discovery of microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional gene regulation”
I'm surprised they didn't have a nobel prize already. The role of micro RNAs in gene regulation has been well established for decades. It's well deserved though. This discovery showed that RNAs...
I'm surprised they didn't have a nobel prize already. The role of micro RNAs in gene regulation has been well established for decades. It's well deserved though. This discovery showed that RNAs play a much bigger role in the cell than what we gave them credit for and opened up whole new areas of research.
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2024 Tuesday 8th October 2024 News coverage: The Guardian: Nobel prize in physics given to researchers for pioneering work on machine learning Ian Sample The New York...
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2024
John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton “for foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks”
If your jaw dropped as you watched the latest AI-generated video, your bank balance was saved from criminals by a fraud detection system, or your day was made a little easier because you were able to dictate a text message on the run, you have many scientists, mathematicians and engineers to thank.
But two names stand out for foundational contributions to the deep learning technology that makes those experiences possible: Princeton University physicist John Hopfield and University of Toronto computer scientist Geoffrey Hinton.
The Conversation – Ambuj Tewari – 8th October 2024
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 Wednesday 9th October 2024 News coverage: The Guardian: Google DeepMind scientists win Nobel chemistry prize Hannah Devlin Reuters: Baker, Hassabis, Jumper win...
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024
David Baker “for computational protein design” & Demis Hassabis and John Jumper “for protein structure prediction”
Most 17-year-olds spend their days playing video games, but Britain’s latest Nobel prize winner spent his teenage years developing them.
Sir Demis Hassabis, who was jointly awarded the chemistry prize on Wednesday, got his big break in the tech world as co-designer of 1994’s hit game Theme Park, where players create and operate amusement parks.
And once again the Nobel Prize for Chemistry goes to biology. Every other year, it's like they hand out a second Prize in Medicine or Physiology. Anything for Paul Alivisatos? No. Krzysztof...
And once again the Nobel Prize for Chemistry goes to biology. Every other year, it's like they hand out a second Prize in Medicine or Physiology.
Anything for Paul Alivisatos? No.
Krzysztof Matyjaszewski? No.
George Whitesides? Amazingly, no.
Wally Broecker is never going to get one, now that he's passed on, but I guess describing the oceanic conveyor belt, the carbon cycle, and “global warming” wasn't enough for Oslo.
Geraldine Richmond for enhancing our understanding of surface science? Nope.
I'm happy for the winners, but there is a whole field of chemistry that has nothing to do with medical applications and it is still revolutionary, ubiquitous, and beautiful if only we can recognize it as such.
The scientific prizes are decided by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It's only the Peace Prize that's handed out by the Nobel Committee in Oslo.
I guess describing the oceanic conveyor belt, the carbon cycle, and “global warming” wasn't enough for Oslo.
The scientific prizes are decided by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It's only the Peace Prize that's handed out by the Nobel Committee in Oslo.
Ah, thank you for the clarification. Apologies for the gripes. Seeing the Physics prize get handed to Hinton was also odd. Computer science is a wonderful field, but I'm confused as to why...
Ah, thank you for the clarification. Apologies for the gripes. Seeing the Physics prize get handed to Hinton was also odd. Computer science is a wonderful field, but I'm confused as to why Geoffrey Hinton, who never studied or published in Physics, is receiving the Nobel prize in physics. At least they included John Hopfield.
Yeah, I think they're running into the issue that a lot of modern scientific fields simply didn't exist back when Alfred Nobel wrote his testament. It would be a bit strange if machine...
Yeah, I think they're running into the issue that a lot of modern scientific fields simply didn't exist back when Alfred Nobel wrote his testament. It would be a bit strange if machine learning/artificial neural networks, a field that's like cross-disciplinary relevant to almost all fields of science, never got acknowledged by the premier award in all of science. There just isn't anywhere else to "slot it in". At least that's my guess as to why.
I wouldn’t find it strange simply because Math has always been the omission from the Nobel Prize array because Nobel hated math. Machine learning/AI is 99% in the field of math. It has about as...
I wouldn’t find it strange simply because Math has always been the omission from the Nobel Prize array because Nobel hated math. Machine learning/AI is 99% in the field of math. It has about as much relationship to any of the physical sciences as a tree search algorithm has to do with biology.
I have to disagree. It's no more "99% math" than theoretical physics. In a year where they awarded a prize for the practical application of the technology in chemistry, it makes perfect sense to...
I have to disagree. It's no more "99% math" than theoretical physics. In a year where they awarded a prize for the practical application of the technology in chemistry, it makes perfect sense to award the theoretical underpinnings of said practical application as well.
Maybe for a specific application. AlphaFold for biology, for instance, seems much easier to justify. Hinden’s work is 99.999% math, and I’d be curious to hear why you think it isn’t.
Maybe for a specific application. AlphaFold for biology, for instance, seems much easier to justify. Hinden’s work is 99.999% math, and I’d be curious to hear why you think it isn’t.
I think the study of intelligence is inherently connected with science in a way that most theoretical math isn't. I also think as a matter of principle, if a technology is invented that is...
I think the study of intelligence is inherently connected with science in a way that most theoretical math isn't. I also think as a matter of principle, if a technology is invented that is relevant to almost all fields of natural science, it's within the purview of the premier award in science to award the theoretical underpinnings of that technology, even if they're mostly math/computer science-y in nature.
Despite the name, “AI” has very little to do with studying intelligence. The lineage of machine learning is linear regression. Modern deep neural networks are fundamentally just highly dimensioned...
Despite the name, “AI” has very little to do with studying intelligence. The lineage of machine learning is linear regression. Modern deep neural networks are fundamentally just highly dimensioned non-linear models being trained with greedy optimization techniques.
It’s like saying the study of DFS studies botany.
it's within the purview of the premier award in science to award the theoretical underpinnings of that technology
The issue with this view is that the Nobel prizes have never been this, because Nobel personally had a vendetta against mathematics, and mathematics has always been the underpinning of science.
If the organizers want to add a maths section, by all means, it’s been a long time coming. But if it’s going to explicitly omit math as the founder wanted it to, then it should be omitted machine learning research. Because it is just math.
I think we just have fundamentally different views on this topic. You seem to be entirely focused on the means and not the end result. The purpose of the field of AI research, going back to...
I think we just have fundamentally different views on this topic. You seem to be entirely focused on the means and not the end result. The purpose of the field of AI research, going back to Turing, has been to replicate intelligent behavior. The means are statistics and computer science, but that's like saying the human brain isn't relevant to psychology because it's just physics which is just applied math which is just a particular application of theoretical math. The context matters a lot.
If machine learning didn't have any scientific applications, I'd agree with you. But it does. Regardless, I don't think we'll reach an agreement on this, but I appreciate your perspective, it just simply doesn't line up with my own.
I don't agree, though. "AI" is a buzzword, it's not what the research use to be called, and it's mainly used now as a buzzword. I did undergrad work for ML research, it's just not my experience...
I don't agree, though. "AI" is a buzzword, it's not what the research use to be called, and it's mainly used now as a buzzword. I did undergrad work for ML research, it's just not my experience that anyone was doing "intelligence research". I was working on denoising models at the time, it was hardly an exercise in making skynet, though this vertical eventually would produce stable diffusion.
What was the research done for transformers? It was not to make a sentient person, it was for Google to do analysis on text for advertising purposes (BERT was the OG call to fame for transformers).
Hinden's research, which many people have issues with anyway, was not trying to replicate intelligent behavior.
It's fundamentally research into stochastic models for the purpose of estimating posterior probabilities. That's what deep neural networks are made for.
It's a buzzword that was coined by John McCarthy in 1956. It might be overhyped at the moment, and applied incorrectly and overeagerly, but it's certainly not a new word or concept and I'm not...
"AI" is a buzzword, it's not what the research use to be called
It's a buzzword that was coined by John McCarthy in 1956. It might be overhyped at the moment, and applied incorrectly and overeagerly, but it's certainly not a new word or concept and I'm not basing the above opinion on hype from the past five years.
Sure, and there in is the rub, none of what Hinden was working on, or 90% of anything in what’s called “AI research” today would count as AI research by the 1956 definition. What exactly is the...
Sure, and there in is the rub, none of what Hinden was working on, or 90% of anything in what’s called “AI research” today would count as AI research by the 1956 definition. What exactly is the agent and what is the environment in BERT?
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2024 Thursday 10th October 2024 News coverage: The Guardian: South Korean author Han Kang wins the 2024 Nobel prize in literature Ella Creamer The New York Times: Han...
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2024
Han Kang “for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life”
The announcement of the South Korean writer Han Kang as the 2024 Nobel Literature laureate is a triumph not only for Korean literature but also a reminder of the huge reach and influence of small press publishing, which takes on so much of the heavy work of introducing literature in translation to a wider audience.
The Guardian – Catherine Taylor – 10th October 2024
The Nobel Peace Prize 2024 Friday 11th October 2024 News coverage: The Guardian: Nobel peace prize awarded to Japanese atomic bomb survivors’ group Justin McCurry BBC News: Japanese atomic bomb...
The Nobel Peace Prize 2024
Nihon Hidankyo “for its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again”
The organization is made up of Hibakusha, also known as survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs attack by the U.S. that killed some 120,000 people in August 1945. (A comparable number of others passed due to the burn and radiation injuries from the attack.) Nihon Hidankyo was chosen for the prize, in part, for the role their personal testimony has played in “stigmatizing the use of nuclear weapons” as unacceptable.
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2024 Monday 14th October 2024 News coverage: Euronews: Three win Nobel Prize in Economics for research in global...
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2024
Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James A. Robinson “for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity”
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2024
Monday 7th October 2024
News coverage:
The Guardian:
Nobel prize in medicine awarded to scientists for work on microRNA
Nicola Davis
The New York Times:
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine Is Awarded to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun
The New York Times
Reuters:
Nobel prize for medicine goes to U.S. scientists Ambros and Ruvkun
Reuters
New Scientist:
Nobel prize for medicine goes to the pair who discovered microRNA
Michael Le Page
I'm surprised they didn't have a nobel prize already. The role of micro RNAs in gene regulation has been well established for decades. It's well deserved though. This discovery showed that RNAs play a much bigger role in the cell than what we gave them credit for and opened up whole new areas of research.
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2024
Tuesday 8th October 2024
News coverage:
The Guardian:
Nobel prize in physics given to researchers for pioneering work on machine learning
Ian Sample
The New York Times:
Nobel Prize in Physics Is Awarded to 2 Scientists for Work on Machine Learning
Derrick Bryson Taylor
CNN:
Nobel Prize in physics awarded to John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton for work on artificial intelligence
Christian Edwards
New Scientist:
Nobel prize for physics goes to pair who invented key AI techniques
Alex Wilkins
Nobel Prize in physics spotlights key breakthroughs in AI revolution − making machines that learn
The Conversation – Ambuj Tewari – 8th October 2024
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024
Wednesday 9th October 2024
News coverage:
The Guardian:
Google DeepMind scientists win Nobel chemistry prize
Hannah Devlin
Reuters:
Baker, Hassabis, Jumper win 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Johan Ahlander & Niklas Pollard
CNN:
Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded to trio of scientists for work on proteins
Christian Edwards & Katie Hunt
New Scientist:
Nobel prize in chemistry awarded for mastering structures of proteins
Michael Le Page
Demis Hassabis: from video game designer to Nobel prize winner
The Guardian – Dan Milmo – 9th October 2024
And once again the Nobel Prize for Chemistry goes to biology. Every other year, it's like they hand out a second Prize in Medicine or Physiology.
Anything for Paul Alivisatos? No.
Krzysztof Matyjaszewski? No.
George Whitesides? Amazingly, no.
Wally Broecker is never going to get one, now that he's passed on, but I guess describing the oceanic conveyor belt, the carbon cycle, and “global warming” wasn't enough for Oslo.
Geraldine Richmond for enhancing our understanding of surface science? Nope.
I'm happy for the winners, but there is a whole field of chemistry that has nothing to do with medical applications and it is still revolutionary, ubiquitous, and beautiful if only we can recognize it as such.
The scientific prizes are decided by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It's only the Peace Prize that's handed out by the Nobel Committee in Oslo.
Ah, thank you for the clarification. Apologies for the gripes. Seeing the Physics prize get handed to Hinton was also odd. Computer science is a wonderful field, but I'm confused as to why Geoffrey Hinton, who never studied or published in Physics, is receiving the Nobel prize in physics. At least they included John Hopfield.
Yeah, I think they're running into the issue that a lot of modern scientific fields simply didn't exist back when Alfred Nobel wrote his testament. It would be a bit strange if machine learning/artificial neural networks, a field that's like cross-disciplinary relevant to almost all fields of science, never got acknowledged by the premier award in all of science. There just isn't anywhere else to "slot it in". At least that's my guess as to why.
I wouldn’t find it strange simply because Math has always been the omission from the Nobel Prize array because Nobel hated math. Machine learning/AI is 99% in the field of math. It has about as much relationship to any of the physical sciences as a tree search algorithm has to do with biology.
I have to disagree. It's no more "99% math" than theoretical physics. In a year where they awarded a prize for the practical application of the technology in chemistry, it makes perfect sense to award the theoretical underpinnings of said practical application as well.
That's just my opinion of course.
Maybe for a specific application. AlphaFold for biology, for instance, seems much easier to justify. Hinden’s work is 99.999% math, and I’d be curious to hear why you think it isn’t.
I think the study of intelligence is inherently connected with science in a way that most theoretical math isn't. I also think as a matter of principle, if a technology is invented that is relevant to almost all fields of natural science, it's within the purview of the premier award in science to award the theoretical underpinnings of that technology, even if they're mostly math/computer science-y in nature.
Despite the name, “AI” has very little to do with studying intelligence. The lineage of machine learning is linear regression. Modern deep neural networks are fundamentally just highly dimensioned non-linear models being trained with greedy optimization techniques.
It’s like saying the study of DFS studies botany.
The issue with this view is that the Nobel prizes have never been this, because Nobel personally had a vendetta against mathematics, and mathematics has always been the underpinning of science.
If the organizers want to add a maths section, by all means, it’s been a long time coming. But if it’s going to explicitly omit math as the founder wanted it to, then it should be omitted machine learning research. Because it is just math.
I think we just have fundamentally different views on this topic. You seem to be entirely focused on the means and not the end result. The purpose of the field of AI research, going back to Turing, has been to replicate intelligent behavior. The means are statistics and computer science, but that's like saying the human brain isn't relevant to psychology because it's just physics which is just applied math which is just a particular application of theoretical math. The context matters a lot.
If machine learning didn't have any scientific applications, I'd agree with you. But it does. Regardless, I don't think we'll reach an agreement on this, but I appreciate your perspective, it just simply doesn't line up with my own.
I don't agree, though. "AI" is a buzzword, it's not what the research use to be called, and it's mainly used now as a buzzword. I did undergrad work for ML research, it's just not my experience that anyone was doing "intelligence research". I was working on denoising models at the time, it was hardly an exercise in making skynet, though this vertical eventually would produce stable diffusion.
What was the research done for transformers? It was not to make a sentient person, it was for Google to do analysis on text for advertising purposes (BERT was the OG call to fame for transformers).
Hinden's research, which many people have issues with anyway, was not trying to replicate intelligent behavior.
It's fundamentally research into stochastic models for the purpose of estimating posterior probabilities. That's what deep neural networks are made for.
It's a buzzword that was coined by John McCarthy in 1956. It might be overhyped at the moment, and applied incorrectly and overeagerly, but it's certainly not a new word or concept and I'm not basing the above opinion on hype from the past five years.
Sure, and there in is the rub, none of what Hinden was working on, or 90% of anything in what’s called “AI research” today would count as AI research by the 1956 definition. What exactly is the agent and what is the environment in BERT?
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2024
Thursday 10th October 2024
News coverage:
The Guardian:
South Korean author Han Kang wins the 2024 Nobel prize in literature
Ella Creamer
The New York Times:
Han Kang Is Awarded Nobel Prize in Literature
Alex Marshall
CNN:
Han Kang wins Nobel Prize in literature for ‘intense poetic prose’ confronting human fragility
Christian Edwards
Literary Hub:
Han Kang has won the Nobel Prize in Literature
Emily Temple
Han Kang’s Nobel win is testament to importance of small press publishing
The Guardian – Catherine Taylor – 10th October 2024
The Nobel Peace Prize 2024
Friday 11th October 2024
News coverage:
The Guardian:
Nobel peace prize awarded to Japanese atomic bomb survivors’ group
Justin McCurry
BBC News:
Japanese atomic bomb survivors win Nobel Peace Prize
Anna Lamche & James Landale
Associated Press:
Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Japanese organization of atomic bombing survivors Nihon Hidankyo
Mike Corder & Elena Becatoros
Meet the Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize—Nihon Hidankyo
Time – Solcyré Burga – 11th October 2024
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2024
Monday 14th October 2024
News coverage:
Euronews:
Three win Nobel Prize in Economics for research in global inequality
Eleanor Butler
CNBC:
Nobel economics prize for 2024 awarded to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James Robinson
Jenni Reid