Nobel tourism

Alfred Nobel (1833-1896) was a Swedish chemist, most famous for inventing dynamite, and founding the Nobel Prize, which has awarded since 1901 for efforts in medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and peace. All prizes are presented in Stockholm, except the peace prize which is presented in Oslo.

This article includes destinations related to the life and works of Alfred Nobel, as well as the prize.

Understand
Alfred Nobel was something of a pacifist and was dismayed at the many military and terroristic uses of his invention, dynamite, the first safe high potency explosive. According to an often-repeated story, Nobel was so distraught when a premature obituary called him "the merchant of death" that he decided to use his (in his mind) ill-begotten wealth for more noble aims, thus instituting the Nobel Prize from his inheritance.

The Nobel Prize
According to Nobel's will, the prize laureates are selected by institutions in Sweden and Norway: the Swedish Royal Science Academy for physics and chemistry, the Karolinska Institute for medicine, the Swedish Academy for literature, and a committee appointed by the Norwegian Parliament (Storting) for peace. All prizes can be shared by up to three individuals, except the peace prize, which can be awarded to organizations. It is not entirely clear why Nobel chose a Norwegian institution (and a parliament at that) for the peace prize when all other prices were to be awarded by Swedish institutions, but a possible explanation lies in the political institutions of the time; when Nobel wrote his will, Norway was still in a union with Sweden and the Norwegian parliament had no official role in foreign policy. It is therefore believed that Nobel thought the Norwegian parliament would be the most qualified body that could be relied on to be sufficiently neutral to award the Peace Prize. Its subsequent history has shown this to not always hold up as Nobel had planned.

Nobel's will says that a laureate should be rewarded "whether he is Scandinavian or not". This statement was controversial in the late 19th century, during the height of nationalism, as philantropists were expected to serve their homeland, or at least their own cultural sphere. Sweden was in a union with Norway until 1905, and the other Nordic nations were seen as brother peoples, with a Scandinavian union considered but never realized. Ironically, Nobel's internationalist clause made the Nobel Prize world famous, and gave Sweden more prestige than anyone could expect.

The laureates are revealed in early October, one prize daily from Monday to Friday. The physics, chemistry and medicine prizes are main events within the global scientific community; still, international news media tend to emphasize the literature prize on Thursday, and perhaps even more the peace prize on Friday.

The prizes are presented on 10 December. In Stockholm, the laureates receive the medal and diploma from the hands of the monarch of Sweden.

While the "scientific" Nobel Prizes have had their share of scandals - several medical procedures once deemed worthy of a Nobel Prize are now seen as ethically dubious at the least- the biggest controversies naturally surround the awarding of the much more subjective Nobel Prizes for Peace and Literature. Was Rosalind Franklin denied the prize because she was a female? Some say she was more worthy than Crick and Watson who actually won it. The double edged nature of scientific advancement that was a theme of Nobel's own life can be seen also in the works of Nobel laureates like Fritz Haber (inventor of a new method to synthesize ammonia from nitrogen - used for both fertilizer and bombs) or those involved in the research into nuclear physics, which were used both to produce energy and to destroy cities in war.

Nobel Prizes have always reflected political and economic realities. Prior to the Nazi era, German scientists dominated the Nobel Prizes for physics, medicine and chemistry, a position now enjoyed by the United States. The literature Nobel Prize is often accused of having a Western, particularly Nordic bias, and the peace prize is mired in politics to the point that some laureates have themselves declared they hadn't (yet) deserved the honor when it was announced.

Winning a prize puts the winner in the elite of his/her profession.

Related awards
The Nobel Memorial Prize for Economics is presented together with the Nobel Prizes; it was however founded in 1969 by the Swedish Riksbank (Sweden's central bank) and is casually referred to as the "Nobel Prize for economics", though it has no connection whatsoever with any member of the Nobel family.

The Crafoord Prize was founded by Swedish industrialist Holger Crafoord (1908-1982), awarded since 1982 in sciences not covered by the Nobel Prize: astronomy and mathematics, geosciences, and biosciences, following a triennal schedule. The prize can also be awarded for polyarthritis research, since Holger Crafoord had the disease. As for the Nobel Prize, the Crafoord laureates are selected by the Scientific Academy, and receive the award from the Monarch of Sweden.

Like the Nobel Prize, the Polar Music Prize is handed out annually by the Monarch of Sweden in the Stockholm Concert Hall. The prize was founded by Stig Andersson, famous as ABBA's manager, and has been awarded since 1992, usually in two categories: classical and popular music.

Many awards in other fields are sometimes referred to as "the Nobel prize of x" and some institutions deliberately award amounts of money similar to or higher than that awarded for Nobel Prizes to draw attention to their prize and/or convince potential laureates to accept them. Perhaps the most famous of these are the Fields Medal in mathematics, the Turing Award in computer science, the Pulitzer Prize in journalism and the Pritzker Prize in architecture.

Stockholm