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Quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics

Quantum theory and the Nobel prize

02 Aug 2002

Personal prejudices and a lack of understanding by the Nobel-prize committee left the pioneers of quantum mechanics unrewarded until the discovery of antimatter in 1932.

Prize and prejudices

In 1933 the Nobel prizes seemed of little importance compared with the global economic depression and the rise to power of the Nazis, but many physicists still kept a watchful eye on Stockholm. Their bewilderment and chagrin over the most recent decisions by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences had fuelled anticipation. No prize had been awarded in physics since 1930, yet recent theoretical and experimental achievements had led to a revolutionary new quantum-mechanical depiction of the atom. Would the Academy finally acknowledge these accomplishments?

When the Academy eventually announced its decision in November, the results pleased some, angered others and puzzled many. The prize reserved from 1932 went to Werner Heisenberg alone for “the creation of quantum mechanics, the application of which has, inter alia, led to the discovery of allotropic forms of hydrogen”. Meanwhile, the 1933 prize was shared by Erwin Schrödinger and Paul Dirac for “the discovery of new productive forms of atomic theory”.

The prizes for quantum mechanics have long been the subject of speculation and gossip. Why were these men the only ones to be rewarded, why were the prizes divided so awkwardly, and why was the official rationale for the awards so odd? More generally, the 1933 decisions point to the broader question that peppers both popular and scholarly histories of modern physics: why were so few Nobel prizes awarded for theoretical contributions? Was this the result of Alfred Nobel’s testament, which specifies that the prize is awarded for “discovery or invention in the field of physics”? Is it inherently more difficult to define a theoretical breakthrough as a discovery?

I have studied the Nobel archives, and the correspondence of former committee members, in an effort to clarify the reasons for the traditional neglect of theory, as well as to make sense of the 1933 prizes (see Friedman in further reading). These activities have provided an insight into the committee’s treatment of theoretical accomplishments prior to 1933, which helps us to understand the significance of the awards that year, including the last-minute inclusion of Paul Dirac among the winners.

Academy rewards

The Nobel prizes may well be international in scope but from the start the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences based its decisions on the recommendations of the five members of the Nobel committees for physics and chemistry. The Swedish committee members’ own judgement, their understanding of science and their interests have been critical to the outcome. Those scientists invited to submit nominations rarely provided the committees with a clear consensus. And even when a single strong candidate did emerge – such as Albert Einstein for relativity theory or Henri Poincaré for various contributions to mathematical physics – the committees often ignored the mandate. A simple change in the composition of the committee could, on occasion, decide the fate of a candidate.

Although the five committee members evaluated the candidates and proposed who should receive a prize, their recommendation still had to be approved by the ten members of the Academy’s Physics Section, and then by the 100 members of the full Academy. Usually the committee’s authority prevailed, but not always. Sometimes the Academy of Sciences rebelled against its committees. In the cases of Gustaf Dalén (1912) and Jean Perrin (1926), members of the Academy successfully rallied their colleagues to overturn the committee’s declaration that these candidates did not merit prizes.

Although formal statutes govern all aspects of the Nobel system, they by no means provide unambiguous guidelines for the committees to go about their business. Such crucial phrases as “most significant discovery or invention in the field of physics” or “recent” or “benefit on mankind” are not defined. Interpretive traditions have arisen and changed over time. But even when everyone involved has tried to rise above pettiness and partiality, the task of selecting winners has always been – and remains – exceedingly difficult. Occasionally committee members have confessed privately that, at times, there have been several equally deserving candidates.

Experimental bias

In the early 1900s some committee members tried to back candidates whose work reflected their own scientific tendencies. Most of the committee belonged to a school of experimental physics at Uppsala University that placed precision measurement as the highest goal for their discipline. For example, Bernhard Hasselberg – a committee member from 1901 to 1922 – considered Albert Michelson to be a model physicist and shared his quest to push the limits of precision to further decimal points of exactitude.

Michelson was by no means an inevitable winner. Yet in spite of receiving only a few nominations, he began emerging as a significant candidate in 1904 through Hasselberg’s advocacy. The Swedish physicist prized Michelson’s use of his interferometer in metrology and, in particular, for determining experimentally the length of the international metre. By 1907 Hasselberg confided privately that he was prepared “to do all in my power to procure the prize for him [Michelson]”. However, Hasselberg had to overcome the fact that Michelson was not a popular candidate and that his work did not fulfil the statutory requirement of having made a “discovery”.

In his report to the committee, Hasselberg declared that Michelson’s investigations merited acclaim even though they had not led to a major discovery. Precision measurement in itself, he asserted, constituted a precondition for discovery. A committee seeking to interpret the statutes strictly might well have discounted this rhetorical manoeuvre, but Hasselberg hardly risked losing face. He knew that the majority of the committee, including the chairman Knut Ångström, shared his belief in precision measurement as the foremost means for progress in physics. The 1907 Nobel Prize for Physics therefore went to Michelson for his “optical precision instruments and the spectroscopic and metrological investigations carried out with their aid”. His well-known ether-drag experiment scarcely received a mention.

Awarding a prize to Michelson enabled Hasselberg and his like-minded Uppsala colleagues to argue that precision measurement “is the very root, the essential condition, of our penetration deeper into the laws of physics – our only way to new discoveries”. Here was an opportunity to celebrate and assert this conception of physics – and themselves.

Just as an experimental bias in the committee benefited Michelson, it also worked to the detriment of candidates who were nominated for theoretical achievements. In 1911 Vilhelm Carlheim-Gyllensköld, a newly elected committee member from Stockholm University, wrote a note of protest to the Academy in which he contrasted the high standing of mathematical and theoretical physics in the scientific world at large with the minimal representation it received through the Nobel prizes.

Apart from Hendrik Lorentz’s share of the 1902 prize for explaining the Zeeman effect and, to some extent, the prize awarded to J J Thomson in 1906 for the conduction of electricity in gases, Carlheim-Gyllensköld complained that “the Nobel prizes have up to now been restricted to experimental physicists”. He stressed that the neglect of mathematical and theoretical physics was not due to a lack of nominations. Among the prominent theorists who had been proposed were Ludwig Boltzmann, Oliver Heaviside, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Max Planck, Poincaré, John Poynting and Wilhelm Wien. In most cases they were nominated by physicists with impeccable experimental credentials, including Henri Becquerel, Philipp Lenard, Wilhelm Röntgen and Pieter Zeeman, all themselves Nobel laureates. “These numerous votes”, Carlheim-Gyllensköld implored, “merit attention.”

But successive committees continued to ignore the growing number of nominations for Planck and other theoretical physicists. The problem was that few, if any, of the members could follow the developments in quantum theory and relativity. Indeed, the eventual award of a prize to Planck – the reserved 1918 prize that was awarded in 1919 – represents more a desire to acknowledge the leader of German science at a time of national tragedy than an acceptance of quantum theory. In fact, experimentalists on the committee wanted to give the reserved 1918 prize to the atomic physicist Johannes Stark followed by the 1919 prize to Planck in order to underline the greater importance of precision experiment over theoretical speculation. Of course, the chronology of their respective achievements dictated otherwise.

Defining moment for theoretical physics

The case of Einstein marked a turning point. Following the November 1919 eclipse expedition, which confirmed that light from distant stars is bent by the Sun’s gravity, Einstein began receiving an increasing number of nominations for his theoretical work on relativity. However, the Academy announced the winner of the 1920 prize to be Charles-Edouard Guillaume – who had been nominated solely by the Genevan physicist Charles Guye – for having discovered a nickel-steel alloy that remained relatively unaffected by changes in its environment. Although “invar” enabled a variety of instruments to make precision measurements with greater accuracy, observers abroad – even those who disliked Einstein’s work – found Guillaume a bizarre choice.

What was going on at the Academy? Simple: few, if any, committee members had been sufficiently convinced by the 1919 solar eclipse to change their negative attitude toward Einstein. Moreover, it was one of Hasselberg’s last requests, after two decades of service on the committee, to see that his precision-measurement colleague Guillaume was rewarded.

In 1921 nominators depicted Einstein as a giant in the world of physics, the likes of which had not been seen since Newton. In 1921 Allvar Gullstrand, professor of physical and physiological optics at Uppsala University and one of the most distinguished members of the Academy, took it upon himself to report on Einstein’s contributions to relativity and gravitational theory. Gullstrand simply did not understand Einstein’s work. Nevertheless, he resolved that Einstein must not receive the prize.

While preparing his special report for the committee, Gullstrand turned to his Uppsala colleague and friend Carl Wilhelm Oseen, who was professor of mechanics and mathematical physics. He presented bits and pieces of his critique to Oseen, who in turn revealed Gullstrand’s erroneous understanding. Oseen himself harboured strong doubts about the validity of the relativity theories, but he was willing to give Einstein a fair hearing. Privately he confessed that it was a disaster for the committee to have Gullstrand, the representative for theoretical physics, evaluate things he did not understand.

Gullstrand had no trouble blocking Einstein in the committee. No member approved of relativity theory. As Hasselberg wrote from his sick bed in 1921: “It is highly improbable that [Alfred] Nobel considered speculations such as these to be the object of his prizes.” Most committee members simply could not accept such work as being true physics. Einstein’s manner of revising fundamental assumptions and of seeking unifying theories seemed to them to be the work of a metaphysician rather than a member of their scientific tribe.

If the issue was simply Gullstrand’s faulty evaluation, then in principle the Academy was free to act once this was brought to light. But most members of the Academy had little inclination to give Einstein a Nobel prize, and no desire to slight its own esteemed member. Swedish “expertise” had spoken; the Academy guarded its own authority and its own right to assess and judge. As the clock approached midnight on 12 November 1921, the Academy voted not to award a Nobel prize in physics that year.

Carl Wilhem Oseen’s Nobel debut

Oseen joined the committee in 1922. He wanted a prize for Einstein, but not for the work on relativity. He also very much wanted to see Niels Bohr receive a prize. Bringing his superior command of physics and sharp analytic talents to the task, Oseen found an ingenious way to reward both of them. He himself successfully nominated Einstein for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect. He specified that regardless of the theoretical methods Einstein had used – which included too much quantum theory to be accepted by the Academy – the law itself had been empirically verified. And having declared that the law of the photoelectric effect was a fundamental truth of nature, Oseen could argue for Bohr’s quantum model of the atom. Previously the committee had dismissed this work as being in conflict with physical reality. Now Oseen asserted that Bohr’s atom rested on a solid foundation – Einstein’s law – and rallied the committee and Academy to back his proposals.

Oseen’s debut on the committee in 1922 brought with it expertise in theoretical physics for the first time, but this did not make it any easier for theoretical achievements to gain approval. Oseen combined great intellectual rigour with arrogance, and these are not necessarily the best qualities for a Nobel-committee member. He often played prosecuting attorney, judge and hangman when evaluating candidates to a far greater degree than his colleagues. When others disagreed with his views, he retaliated with scathing counter-arguments, as well as personal offence.

Oseen left deep marks in the Nobel competition long after his time in power ended in 1944. He led the movement to narrow the scope of “physics” that was eligible for the prize, reversing the earlier practice of including fields such as astrophysics and geophysics. But most importantly, although his own work entailed hydrodynamics and the physics of crystal lattices, he sat in judgement of all theoretical physics, in particular atomic physics.

Oseen was not happy with the way physics was developing; his own demand for clear logical consistency drove him to despair in the 1920s over partial and temporary solutions to the deep crises of atomic physics. He longed for a giant to enter who might sweep away all the inconsistencies and culturally alarming implications, and make physics right. He saw little reason in celebrating half solutions, temporary scaffolding, and piecemeal steps towards an unknown future.

Rather than finding, as Oseen had hoped, a way of reconciling the chaotic findings of quantum physics with the classical foundations of the subject, researchers were proposing ever-more outlandish theories. In the mid-1920s Heisenberg proposed that the traditional goal of visualizing atomic processes should be relinquished. Sophisticated mathematical equations capable of generating numerical solutions that agreed with observed data would be the way forward. This was not to Oseen’s liking. And then came claims that on the atomic level, probability rather than determinism reigned supreme.

Oseen agonized over these developments but he increasingly withdrew from active participation. Yet he showed no desire to relinquish the Nobel tiller. The paucity of awards for theoretical achievement during Oseen’s reign on the committee reflects his sensibilities, rather than formal obstacles or scarcity of candidates.

Resisting quantum mechanics

From the mid-1920s Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrödinger began to lay new foundations for interpreting atomic phenomena. A trickle of nominations for their differing approaches began in 1928, and then grew more convincing in numbers and rationale by the end of the decade.

Some nominators preferred Schrödinger’s more visual depiction of electron orbits as a form of wave mechanics. Older theoretical physicists, such as Einstein, Planck and Max von Laue, preferred this approach to Heisenberg’s more drastic step of non-representational models of atomic processes. Moreover, implications arising from Heisenberg’s work seemed to overturn physicists’ traditional belief in causality. A number of physicists working closely with Heisenberg – including Bohr, Wolfgang Pauli and Max Born – were opening the door to a sub-atomic world that differed radically from the physics of larger-scale phenomena. Still, the theories seemed to be working and they began drawing nominations from leading physicists.

Oseen did what he could to avoid recognizing Schrödinger and Heisenberg. He might have favoured Schrödinger’s approach but he agreed with the majority of nominators that – if any prize were to be given for quantum mechanics – the two should be rewarded together. Regardless, Oseen created hurdles for their candidacy. These hurdles were rooted in his own intellectual temperament and practical expediency.

In response to the nominations in 1929, Oseen claimed that Schrödinger and Heisenberg’s theories had not sufficiently matured “from a logical point of view” to permit a systematic depiction of the atom. Moreover, he could not declare them eligible for a prize as their theories had not resulted in any discovery of fundamental importance. In other words, Oseen tried to block the pair formally with the statutes.

Support for the two theorists continued in 1930. Again some nominators preferred Schrödinger, others Heisenberg, or a division between Heisenberg and Born, who helped to create the theory. But Nobel laureates as varied as Planck and Perrin endorsed the prevailing thrust to reward Schrödinger and Heisenberg.

To counter Oseen’s intransigence, The Svedberg, an Academy member and physical chemist, nominated Heisenberg and underlined that the theory had predicted and then led to an important discovery – a new form of hydrogen molecule. Oseen responded sarcastically that perhaps Heisenberg should be considered for a Nobel prize in chemistry! Although he conceded that awarding a physics prize for theoretical work that resulted in a chemical discovery was not unthinkable, he again refused to endorse either of the two physicists for a prize.

Perhaps the problem was, as several nominators suggested, that it would be unjust to divide a prize between them. Why should two intellectual giants be forced to a share prize when others might later receive full prizes for lesser accomplishments? Oseen and the rest of the committee found a convenient detour round the entire problem. The Indian experimental physicist Chandrasekhara Raman suddenly emerged as a popular candidate for his discovery of a new process by which molecules scatter light; he received the 1930 prize.

In 1931 the number of nominations for the pioneers of quantum mechanics dropped, possibly because nominators did not want to waste their votes on candidates whom the committee seem to oppose so adamantly. Again, the world of physics was small; many nominators understood who was sitting in judgement and what biases they held. The highly critical, but brilliant, theorist Wolfgang Pauli commented at the time that there were no theoretical physicists in Sweden; he scornfully dismissed Oseen. Some nominators were no doubt puzzled and withheld their proposals.

But without any deeper reflection, Oseen simply claimed that the fall in the number of nominations for Heisenberg and Schrödinger was a sign that enthusiasm for their work was “cooling off”. He attributed this lack of support to the fact that quantum theories did not include the relativistic effects of electron motion: “This problem lies so deep that a completely new thought is necessary for its resolution.” No one could tell how this new and, as yet, inconceivable breakthrough would impact on quantum-mechanical theories. He therefore urged the committee that Heisenberg and Schrödinger must wait; the 1931 prize was reserved to the following year.

Standing firm

Once again, Oseen’s impossibly high standards prompted him to demand a complete theory. Either a theory was fully capable of explaining all relevant phenomena or it was not worth recognition. Nobody denied the need to include relativistic effects, but this did not diminish the esteem in which many physicists held Heisenberg and Schrödinger. Perhaps, as some speculated, Oseen and the committee were trying to buy time so that Heisenberg and Schrödinger could each receive a full prize the following year.

Still, in 1932 nominators began registering impatience. Some even questioned the committee’s willingness and ability to evaluate the work of Heisenberg and Schrödinger. Pauli nominated Heisenberg alone. He wondered whether the committee perhaps could not decide between the two approaches. In such a case, he claimed that Heisenberg’s contribution was more original since Schrödinger derived his from Louis de Broglie. Pauli’s curt voice became almost audible in a letter of nomination seething with annoyance. He thundered that Heisenberg had easily fulfilled the conditions stipulated by the statutes and by Alfred Nobel’s intentions. Give him a prize!

Even Einstein, who only occasionally made nominations, decided to take time to send a proposal for the two. He remarked that he personally preferred Schrödinger’s formulation, but conceded that he might be mistaken as to which party was more deserving. As both theorists were of such importance, he would prefer the prize not to be split between them. Einstein wanted to see Schrödinger awarded first, if only one of them could be rewarded.

Bohr also proposed both pioneers of quantum mechanics. He clearly understood the limitations of the theories and accepted that they were not the end point but an important start. Bohr maintained that Heisenberg and Schrödinger’s contributions had unexpectedly provided a satisfactory perspective on known atomic phenomena and had also led to a series of new predictions. He proposed using the two available prizes to award them both.

The committee allowed a relatively new member, the experimental atomic physicist Eric Hulthén, to prepare a special report on the relation between quantum mechanics and experimental atomic research. Hulthén analysed the reciprocal relation between theory and experiment; the theories of Heisenberg and Schrödinger had made sense of crucial data and had stimulated significant experimental and theoretical investigations. While agreeing that further breakthroughs would be necessary to apply quantum mechanics to the innermost electrons nearest the atomic nucleus, the theories’ startling successes within a restricted domain had to be appreciated as an epoch-making chapter in atomic physics. But Oseen balked again.

Oseen strained all he could to find arguments for withholding the prizes. He again appealed to a strict interpretation of “discovery”. Interestingly, a few years earlier he had called for the interpretation to be liberalized, but that was to enable his Uppsala colleague Manne Siegbahn to be eligible for a prize for having greatly improved the precision of X-ray spectroscopy. On one hand, Oseen demanded that a significant discovery arise from the theories. Yet on the other hand, he maintained that the meaning of the word “discovery” in the statutes was the same as the general public’s understanding – “significant progress in knowledge of actual reality” – and therefore the statute had not been fulfilled.

Why did Oseen, in his report to the committee, feel obliged to underline the phrase actual reality? It would appear that he could not accept some of the broader implications of quantum mechanics. Just as Einstein recoiled at the probabilistic interpretation of sub-atomic reality because it did not follow the conventional notion of causality, Oseen pondered the cultural and theological ramifications of the theories. But although Einstein might not have approved, he still acknowledged Heisenberg’s contribution as an ingenious stopgap measure. Both Einstein and Oseen may have longed for a future remedy, but Oseen seemed bent on sulking until that day arrived.

A saviour on the horizon

Among the nominators who called for a prize for quantum mechanics sooner rather than later were two new professors of theoretical physics in Stockholm. Although they were not committee members, Oskar Klein and David Enskog argued persuasively in their letters of nomination. Klein enjoyed a solid international reputation as a significant contributor to the new atomic physics. Having worked at Bohr’s institute for many years, he was “in the loop” of informal communications among atomic physicists. He admitted the weaknesses of quantum mechanics, but claimed the challenges that remained did not detract from Heisenberg and Schrödinger’s tremendous accomplishments.

Enskog also proposed Heisenberg and Schrödinger in a lengthy letter of nomination. In some respects Enskog’s voice should have reminded Oseen that even he could be mistaken in evaluating physics. A decade earlier, Oseen had given Enskog a marginal grade for his dissertation and seemingly ended his academic career. However, Enskog’s work was later discovered abroad and declared to be a brilliant contribution to the theory of gas diffusion. Enskog was resurrected. Still, Oseen was determined to remain the sole judge in Sweden of theoretical physics. He disregarded their opinions.

Oseen again repeated that a satisfactory theory of atomic physics must account for the effects of relativity, hence Heisenberg and Schrödinger simply did not make the grade. He urged the committee to place the 1931 prize money into its special fund and to reserve the 1932 prize until 1933. The majority of the committee voted with Oseen; Hulthén dissented by advocating a division between Heisenberg and Schrödinger. When the full Academy voted on the committee’s proposal, many members appreciated that Oseen was not the only expert in Sweden. In the protocol papers belonging to the Academy’s permanent secretary, the vote – which is normally never recorded – was jotted down, revealing a considerable split: 40 members voted to withhold the award while 23 members wanted to reward Heisenberg and Schrödinger.

Finally, in 1933, Oseen accepted that the time had come. A saviour loomed on the horizon. Oseen learned through his gifted student Ivar Waller that noteworthy advances towards a relativistic theory of quantum mechanics had been achieved. Unlike Oseen, Waller regularly attended international conferences and visited important centres of physics research. He sent news from Cambridge and Copenhagen of Paul Dirac’s theoretical masterpieces, beginning with the 1928 article “The quantum theory of the electron”, as well as the experimental findings that provided support. Indeed, Waller and Dirac had been in close contact; the former’s intense commentaries on Dirac’s earliest papers may even have helped to pave the way towards the famous hole theory that led to the prediction of antimatter. Of course, Oseen remained cautious about Dirac’s conclusions.

Overwhelmingly, the nominators still indicated their desire to reward Heisenberg and Schrödinger with the 1933 prize before considering any other worker in the field, be it Dirac, Pauli or Born. Only two nominators – William Lawrence Bragg and Czeslaw Bialobrzeski – added Dirac to their list of candidates. At its pre-summer meeting to discuss the prizes, the committee voted tentatively to award the reserved 1932 prize to Heisenberg and the 1933 prize to Schrödinger.

Dirac breaks the deadlock

Oseen’s initial evaluation of Dirac was revealing. He asked whether this brilliant British theorist could be compared to Planck, Einstein and Bohr – who suddenly seemed to have set the standard for a Nobel prize. Oseen ruled negatively. But he wondered whether bad timing rather than native ability forced this assessment: on entering physics Dirac had to confront Heisenberg and had devoted his creativity and energy to resolving contradictions in the German physicist’s theory. Noting that most of Dirac’s important work had only just been published, Oseen felt sure that this new star in the firmament of physics would achieve something truly great sometime in the future.

By September Oseen had undergone a change of heart. He now suddenly urged dealing Dirac into the Nobel spoils. Dirac’s odd prediction of the existence of a positively charged electron had been confirmed by two independent experiments. To Oseen’s satisfaction, here was a significant “actual fact” that had been discovered as a result of quantum mechanics – a discovery that “has transformed one of the most difficult reservations against the new atomic theory to a support for this theory”.

For the committee meeting in early September, Oseen included Dirac in the same special report as Heisenberg and Schrödinger. He now linked the three candidates as standing head and shoulders above others. Oseen called for Heisenberg to be the sole recipient of the 1932 prize, emphasizing the discovery of allotropic hydrogen – rather than the uncertainty principle. However, he did allow the citation to describe Heisenberg as the creator of quantum mechanics. Meanwhile, Schrödinger and Dirac shared the 1933 prize for the rather subdued rationale of having made important contributions to atomic physics.

Oseen ensured that both Pauli and Born – both of whom played critical roles in the development of quantum mechanics – would miss out on a prize, at least for as long as he lived. Pauli, according to Oseen, was already past his prime. And although Waller tried to convince him that maybe Pauli’s slower frequency of publication at the time had more to do with the relative difficulty of the problems he chose to tackle than his alleged intellectual exhaustion, Oseen decided that Pauli should not share in a prize.

As late as 1944 – the year of his death – Oseen continued to dismiss Pauli’s contributions to quantum mechanics as metaphysics. The following year Waller joined the committee and helped to ensure a prize for Pauli in 1945. Born waited even longer – until 1954. Although Heisenberg wrote to Born in 1933 to express his regret that they were not sharing the prize, he did nothing to remedy the gaff. He did not, for instance, nominate Born, who had become a refugee from Nazi anti-Semitism. Dirac, Schrödinger and Heisenberg certainly merited prizes, but the manner of distributing prizes to the pioneers of quantum mechanics was perhaps less than fair.

Enduring frustration

As this episode reveals, to understand the “whys and wherefores” of the Nobel prizes, insight into the committee and its Swedish context are essential. The history of awarding the prize during the first 50 years – for which the official archives are accessible – shows that some committee members brought strong agendas and preferences with them; others simply could not fathom achievements that were beyond their intellectual horizons.

Even in more recent times, of course, grumbling and questioning still arise. Dirac, among others, expressed dismay over the difficulties in rewarding achievements in theoretical particle physics in the late 1960s and 1970s. He learned that some members of the committee simply did not want to reward theory; others differed over what degree of empirical confirmation should be expected before allowing a prize for theory. Just as in 1933, Dirac experienced that the Nobel prize – for better or for worse – is a golden medallion etched with human frailties.

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