Nobel Prizes

[rov1200]

It was announced this week that a British physicist working for STL, a British company who invented Fibre Optics for transmission only 50 years ago has received the Nobel Prize. Why did it take so long when Obama received his in less than 9 months?

[Cheeris]

The rules are different.

The awards for Peace must be awarded within a few years or so. However, the rules for the scientific awards stipulate that the significance of the discovery or invention must be 'tested by time'. This is to ensure that only really significant developments are rewarded and that the awards committee don't 'jump the gun' so to speak. I agree its a long time, but it is really is only in the last ten years or so, during the revolution in communications and the spread of information, that fibre optical communications is really having an effect on society and changing people's lives Also, the committee tends to avoid giving awards for 'inventions' in preference to 'discoveries'.

This isn't not unprecedented at all. For example Chandrasekhar got an award for Physics in 1983 for work he did before WWII.

[rov1200]

I can understand the reasoning for waiting a period of time but this invention was well proven into the 80's where it was being successfully used by industry. They have been using it now for over 30 years.

What has been shown recently is that politics has entered the arena of the awards. The fact that some unknown physicist working at a small location in the UK has been overshadowed by the big boys at Caltech in the USA who devote hundreds of scientists on one project. I would find it hard to believe a tremendous amount of lobbying goes on to project their own designs.

[Cheeris]

rov1200 -
Yes, the invention was well-proven into the 80's - I remember as a boy seeing it and its potential applications on 'Tomorrow's World' on the Beeb.

'Well-proven' does not mean 'Significant'; however. Which, I repeat, is the overriding qualification. Post-It notes are HUGELY well-proven and (technically) worthy of Nobel Prize consideration and also have been in use for longer than fibre-optics. But not really 'significant' in that they were really just bits of paper.

And while it was being successfully used by industry in the 80s that doesn't mean it was significant (see also Telex machines, whiteboards and Reaganomics. And also Post-It notes!).

It is only now that fibre-optics are demonstrating their potential beyond the copper wires they were replacing in the 80's, and showing their SIGNIFICANCE. In the 80's their main reason for use was the quality of signal compared to resistance-prone electrical wires. To go back to Tomorrow's World in the 80s, they were first touted in terms of hiss-free telephone calls. Now, it is their exponentially greater capacity for information transfer and communication, or to put in other terms, the Internet explosion.

While I share with you the desire to push the U.K.'s admirable legacy in the technological revolution that started in the second half of the 20thC and is gathering pace in the 21st, I can't agree with your concern at any Caltech or US bias. The awarding committee is in Sweden for one thing, and even for awards given to US scientists they are for work done 30-40+ years ago.