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?

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

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

[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."

Is it possible to permanently quit pornography?

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

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

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

Gina Ortiz Jones, a Progressive, Is Elected San Antonio’s Mayor - The New York Times

Whatever.

Whatever.

There you go.^†

It’s true, cutting calories will make you depressed - The Times

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

You can have your cake and eat it too

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

What causes my mouth to be so dry at night my teeth sticks to my lips?

(Mumbles of assent)

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:

When he's standing, in front of you

What is the "abundance agenda" and how does it relate to supply-side liberalism?

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.

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

"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?"

What is it like to be the slave in a mistress-slave relationship?

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

My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.

^† They rationalise their decision thusly:

Is it ok to be spanked by your parents if you are not in bed in your set bedtime?

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

(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)

Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

How much higher are McDonald's prices going to go?

[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.

Why wait any longer for the one you love?

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

Wright State stuns No. 1 Vanderbilt with historic upset in baseball regionals - Yahoo Sports