Peace Prize vs. Other WInners - Noblemen & women
October 12th 2009 12:40
Barrack Obama as Peace Prize Winner -- I hear he's great fun at dinner parties, likes a beer and smoke but is being more likeable than the previous guy at the White House really enough to make the world a safer place?
Let’s check out the other category winners and see how he measures up:
Chemistry had three winners this year for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome which is a type of protein in cells. Protein synthesis is a one of the building blocks of life so scientific developments can lead to isolating genes and viruses. If you are really into anatomy, check out the Wikipedia line on Ribosomes & RNA.
The chemists:
Ada Yonath from Israel grew up poor but her parents made sacrifices to get her a first class education. She is now a crystallographer.
Venkatraman Ramakrishnan is from India. He is a renowned structural biologist whose work is particularly focused on the ribosome.
And Thomas A. Steitz, is into biocrystallography (but not the aura cleansing kind) and a Professor at Yale university.
For anyone without a post graduate science degree, the first few paragraphs of RNA and ribosome definitions make these guys seem like they are pretty awesome.
The Medicine Winners for this year are also specialised in cell parts, chromosomes in fact.
Several doctors, including an Australian Elizabeth Blackburn, have won the honour for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase. Wow, telomeres are part of the end of a chromosome. If you want to know more, you should look it up here.
Herta Müller takes the literary award on the 20th Anniversary of the fall of communism. Much of what she writes stems from growing up in German Romania. There is some surprise at her nomination as she is not very well known outside of German literary circles.
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Economics should be a little easier for ordinary folks to understand. Two Americans, both super theoretical, mega academisc, test theories in a world excluding other variables outside the university. Elinor Ostrom is famous for her works on the commons which is a university way of saying stuff we all own, like public property. Oliver E. Williamson, the co-winner has scored was chosen because of his work on the boundaries of the firm.
I got my real world application fix in the Physics category. For starters, these scientists have come up with stuff we are all going to use pretty soon. Charles K. Kao in Hong Kong has won for groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibres for optical communication . His peers, William S Boyle and George E Smith have invented an imaging semi conductor circuit. Boyle and Smith share half and Kao keeps half to himself.
Lastly, there is the Peace Prize. Al Gore, Vice President of the United States during the Clinton years, won half the Peace Prize in 2007 for his work on climate change. The current President has not been in the job long however the Nobel committee cite Mr Obama’s extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy as a reason. Now, I think the US public elected Obama because he's a lot less antagonistic in style than his predecessor, who created enemies for Americans, and no one likes being the bad guys.
Barack Obama has captured the Worlds Attention and the fact he is president represents what the world admires about America. Realistically, on both a domestic and international level, he probably hasn't and won't do more things than other leaderes. However, his change in style on foreign policy issues is much appreciated by the non-American world, whose growing resentment was near boiling point even if not quite extraordinary.
Let’s check out the other category winners and see how he measures up:
Chemistry had three winners this year for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome which is a type of protein in cells. Protein synthesis is a one of the building blocks of life so scientific developments can lead to isolating genes and viruses. If you are really into anatomy, check out the Wikipedia line on Ribosomes & RNA.
The chemists:
Ada Yonath from Israel grew up poor but her parents made sacrifices to get her a first class education. She is now a crystallographer.
Venkatraman Ramakrishnan is from India. He is a renowned structural biologist whose work is particularly focused on the ribosome.
And Thomas A. Steitz, is into biocrystallography (but not the aura cleansing kind) and a Professor at Yale university.
For anyone without a post graduate science degree, the first few paragraphs of RNA and ribosome definitions make these guys seem like they are pretty awesome.
The Medicine Winners for this year are also specialised in cell parts, chromosomes in fact.
Several doctors, including an Australian Elizabeth Blackburn, have won the honour for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase. Wow, telomeres are part of the end of a chromosome. If you want to know more, you should look it up here.
Australian Elizabeth Blackburn
Herta Müller takes the literary award on the 20th Anniversary of the fall of communism. Much of what she writes stems from growing up in German Romania. There is some surprise at her nomination as she is not very well known outside of German literary circles.
Literary Winner also controversial
Economics should be a little easier for ordinary folks to understand. Two Americans, both super theoretical, mega academisc, test theories in a world excluding other variables outside the university. Elinor Ostrom is famous for her works on the commons which is a university way of saying stuff we all own, like public property. Oliver E. Williamson, the co-winner has scored was chosen because of his work on the boundaries of the firm.
I got my real world application fix in the Physics category. For starters, these scientists have come up with stuff we are all going to use pretty soon. Charles K. Kao in Hong Kong has won for groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibres for optical communication . His peers, William S Boyle and George E Smith have invented an imaging semi conductor circuit. Boyle and Smith share half and Kao keeps half to himself.
Lastly, there is the Peace Prize. Al Gore, Vice President of the United States during the Clinton years, won half the Peace Prize in 2007 for his work on climate change. The current President has not been in the job long however the Nobel committee cite Mr Obama’s extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy as a reason. Now, I think the US public elected Obama because he's a lot less antagonistic in style than his predecessor, who created enemies for Americans, and no one likes being the bad guys.
Barack Obama has captured the Worlds Attention and the fact he is president represents what the world admires about America. Realistically, on both a domestic and international level, he probably hasn't and won't do more things than other leaderes. However, his change in style on foreign policy issues is much appreciated by the non-American world, whose growing resentment was near boiling point even if not quite extraordinary.
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