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?

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

When he's standing, in front of you

Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

Presidential Message on National Men’s Health Week, 2025 - The White House (.gov)

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

Whatever.

You can have your cake and eat it too

Lighter than normal WWDC expected without significant Apple Intelligence uprgrades - AppleInsider

Whatever.

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

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

Why do all the stupid people think Donald J. Trump is stupid?

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

[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.

(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)

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

Why wait any longer for the one you love?

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:

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

[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."

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

He led George W. Bush's PEPFAR program to stop AIDS. Now he fears for its future - NPR

"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?"

My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.

^† They rationalise their decision thusly:

Why does my narcissistic ex told me that he f*cked and sleep with other woman and then at the end says that it also happened because of me?

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

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

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.

How can someone determine if their partner is in another romantic relationship, particularly if they do not live together?

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

There you go.^†

(Mumbles of assent)

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