How did a computer scientist such as Geoffrey Hinton manage to win a Nobel Prize in physics when computer science already has its own Nobel Prize equivalent in the Turing Awards?

"Good idea, but how can we wangle something that says 'Physics'?"

(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)

Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

Do married men know when their wives are having affairs?

In December 1973, when Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, comedian Tom Lehrer dropped his mic and stamped on it—satire had just died.

"Naah, Linnainmaa is a Finn. Can't give it to a bloody Finnish mathematician. Let's go for drinks. Brännvin anyone?"

In awarding prizes, the Nobel Committees often seem only marginally more competent than MTG is at explaining meteorology. And if they can give a literature prize for lyrics like:

How do you perform a lap dance for your boyfriend or husband?

Whatever.

My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.

(Mumbles of assent)

Is love natural, or is it somehow created?

"Didn't he do something with Boltzmann in it? That sounds physics-y. RBMs and stuff, eh?"

… then anything is possible. There’s no rule that a Nobel Prize has to make sense.^*

"Hey guys, AI is pretty big so let's centre our prizes on it this year. We can get some attention, and it's all about advertising, at the end of the day, isn't it?"

I think that being gay is wrong, but I treat gay people respectfully like any other person. Is it homophobic? Or offensive in any kind of way? Aren’t disagreement and discrimination two different things?

When he's standing, in front of you

"Good point, I'm sure we can swing it. And let's tack on Hopfield while we're about it."

Whatever.

What one thing makes someone a very mature person?

They then move on to selectively provide their own version of history. But hey, it’s OK. They wanted controversy, didn’t they? Whatever.

Fortunately, we are privy to the discussion that led up to this:

There you go.^†

Is there any truth to the claim that Kamala Harris got where she is by sleeping around, or is that just typical conservative bigotry?

A fly on the wall at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences

^† They rationalise their decision thusly:

"Where can we shoehorn it in? Chemistry is easy 'cos AlphaFold; but what about physics? A bit more challenging, right?"

Why the end of Google as we know it could be your biggest opportunity yet - ZDNet

[Older voice] "Mmm. What about Hinton, he's widely regarded? Nobody got fired for buying IBM"

[Younger voice] "But wait a minute, Ising-Lenz goes back to the 1920's. And didn't Hinton plagiarise rather a lot? He also didn't invent modern backprop, did he, that's Linnainmaa? And Amari preceded Hopfield, too. That's not a good look."

^* Fibiger got the 1926 Medicine prize for the discovery of Spiroptera carcinoma (Don’t ask).

Study Links Gut Bacteria to MS Risk and Reveals Key Triggers - Neuroscience News

[The basic structure of artificial neural networks] has close similarities with spin models in statistical physics applied to magnetism or alloy theory. This year’s Nobel Prize in Physics recognizes research exploiting this connection to make breakthrough methodological advances in the field of ANN.

You can have your cake and eat it too

Why wait any longer for the one you love?

What does success really mean to you? Is it about happiness, money, or something else?