Interesting and Curious: Why No Nobel Prize in Mathematics

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Why is there no Nobel Prize in Mathematics?

October 1, 2023, 5:37 pm

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Nobel Prizes have been awarded in various categories since 1901 for contributions to the advancement of mankind. But no Nobel Prize for mathematics. Find out here what a rival of one of Alfred Nobel’s mistresses has to do with it.

Since 1901, Nobel Prizes have been awarded to individuals and institutions who, in the opinion of the jury, have made an exceptional contribution to the advancement of mankind. This year’s shortlisted candidates will be announced from Monday onwards. Some interesting and curious facts about the prestigious awards:

Award ceremonies in absentia

Six Nobel Peace Prize winners since 1901 have failed to receive their awards in Oslo. Journalist and pacifist Karl von Ositzky was in a Nazi concentration camp when he was selected for the prize in 1936. Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov had to be represented in Oslo by his wife, Elena Bonner.

In 1983, Polish Solidarity leader Lech Walesa refused to go to Oslo, fearing that he would not be able to return to his country. Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi was under house arrest when she was honored in 1991. Although the military junta allowed her to go to Oslo, she refused, fearing that she too would not be able to return home.

The 2010 winner, Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, was in prison at the time. His chair was empty at the awards ceremony. In 2022, jailed Belarusian human rights activist Ales Bialiaski was unable to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. His wife Natalia Pinchuk represented him in Oslo.

Posthumous award only in exceptional cases

Since 1974, the Nobel Foundation’s bylaws state that prizes may not be awarded posthumously — unless death occurs after the prize winner is announced. Previously, only two Nobel Prizes were awarded posthumously, the two Swedes Dag Hammarskjöld and Erik Axel Karfeld.

UN Secretary General Hammarskjöld was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize shortly after his death in a plane crash in Africa in 1961. Poet Garfeld also received the Nobel Prize for Literature shortly after his death in 1931.

In 2011, after the Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded to Canadian Ralph Steinman, he was announced dead three days earlier. The Nobel Foundation eventually decided to keep Steinman among the laureates.

Some of the awardees are women

With 60 winners in various categories since 1901, women make up less than six percent of Nobel Prize winners. At 2.2 percent, their share of the economic prize is negligible; The share in science streams is 3.7 percent overall. 14.2 percent of literature laureates are women, and 16 percent of Nobel Peace Prize laureates are women.

So Nobel Prizes are for men. However, that is slowly changing. Since the turn of the century, 31 women have been honored, nearly three times as many as in the previous two decades. In 2009, five women received the prizes, including the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Economics, American scientist Eleanor Ostrom.

Additionally, the first person to win a Nobel Prize twice was a woman: Marie Curie, a Polish-born Frenchwoman, won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 and the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1911.

There is no prize for mathematics

There are Nobel prizes for medicine, chemistry and physics, but none for mathematics. A legend about the causes has been circulated for a long time, but it was only in the 1980s that it was disproved by researchers. Prize founder Alfred Nobel is said to have sought revenge on his mistress’s lover, Magnus Costa Mittag-Leffler. But there are no facts to support this thesis.

This explanation is very plausible: when Nobel wrote his will in 1895, in which he left the prizes, Sweden already had a prestigious prize for mathematics. In addition, the applied natural sciences enjoyed higher esteem than mathematics in the early 20th century.

Celebrations on 10th December

The Nobel Prizes are announced in early October every year. The awards will not be presented until December 10: the science categories, literature and economics in the Swedish capital Stockholm and the Nobel Peace Prize in the Norwegian capital Oslo. Founder Alfred Nobel’s memorial day is December 10. The inventor of dynamite lived from 1833 to 1896.

In Stockholm, the award ceremony is followed by a party at the city’s town hall with 1,300 invited guests. Also King Carl XVI of Sweden. Gustaf and his wife Silvia paid their respects. In Oslo, about a thousand invited guests, including King Harald and his wife Sonja, diplomats and other dignitaries, gathered at the town hall. Later there will be a party for a slightly smaller group at the Grand Hotel.

The Russian ambassador was not invited to last year’s awards ceremony in Stockholm because of Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine. He was first invited this year, but was invited again after heavy criticism. However, in Oslo, the Norwegian Nobel Institute wants to invite ambassadors from all countries.