Recipients of the Nobel Prize receive mixed reactions from public
This year, the Nobel Prizes were awarded in the six regular categories – physics, chemistry, medicine, economics, literature, and peace. The choices of recipients for the various awards have been stirring a strong reaction from many. First, the prize for Medicine went to a trio of scientists – James E. Rothman, Randy W. Schekman and Thomas C. Südhof – for solving the mystery of how cells organize their transport system. The prize for Physics was awarded on Oct. 8 to François Englert and Peter Higgs for pioneering research on the Higgs particle. This particle was finally extracted in the Large Hadron Collider by a team of scientists and has now been proven to exist. The award for Chemistry was awarded on Oct. 9 to Martin Karplus, Michael Levitt, and Arieh Warshel for their invention of computer systems that demonstrate chemical reactions and structural diagrams. The Economics prize was given to Eugene Fama, Lars Peter Hansen, and Robert Schiller for their work in building a system to predict long-term trends in the stock market.
Aside from these four prizes, the two remaining – Peace and Literature – have most definitely been newsworthy. First, the prize for Literature went for the very first time to a Canadian woman. Alice Munro, named the “master of the contemporary short story,” was awarded the prize on Oct.10. Not only was she the first Canadian woman to win the prize, but she was one of only 13 woman to win since the prize was first awarded in 1901. Bringing the Nobel Prize back to Canada is definitely an achievement that will keep Alice Munro immortalized in history.
The second prize that made headlines is by far the most popular every year: the Peace Prize. The favourite to win was a young woman who had been attracting an astounding amount of media attention. The Taliban shot Malala Yousafzai in the head when she was just fourteen, because she advocated for girls’ education in Pakistan. After this, she continued to champion a protest against Taliban rule, and preached education as a human right that should be afforded to every person, regardless of where or how they live. The Taliban were continually issuing threats against not only Yousafzai’s life, but also against her father for supporting her. Despite this, Yousafzai, now 16, continues to campaign for education for girls in the Middle East. She recently appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and rendered him speechless with her ability to speak so intelligently. She was invited to visit President Obama this weekend in the White House, and she lectured him on his use of drones overseas and their impact on innocent civilian lives. Being so young, so intelligent, and fighting for such a noble and just cause, many favoured her as the potential winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. The prize was unfortunately not awarded to Yousafzai, but rather to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. Based on their work in Syria, the Organization was definitely deserving of the prize. However, there has been a lot of controversy over whether or not it is fair to award the prize to an organization when there was a single person who was equally as deserving.
Whether or not you agree with the decisions of the Nobel Prize Committee, it is extremely impressive to see what a teenage girl is capable of in the face of adversity. Yousafzai said she is “unconcerned,” as winning the prize was not her intention. She simply wanted to change the world.