"John Knight" <jwknight at polbox.com> wrote:
>"Bob LeChevalier" <lojbab at lojban.org> wrote in message
>news:asf8mu46oabd8idqd36enbv5q55t2ihqj5 at 4ax.com...>All anybody knew about her then was that she was a
>lab flunky working for a scientist who'd received significant awards and
>made significant discoveries 10-20 years before she ever showed up.
Why would a "lab flunkie" be internationally known, such as by a
foreign (Swedish) mathematician (different field of study), and
thought worthy of him asking why she was not nominated for the Nobel
prize, a prize that had been awarded to only 3 physicists before?
Tell me how many foreign "lab flunkies" that YOU know that are worth
considering for a Nobel prize?
>> >the admitted fact that Pierre secured Marie her part of the prize by his
>letter,
>>>> It is not "admitted". Pierre's letter may or may not have had
>> anything to do with her getting the prize. It was a letter to that
>> "advocate" who obviously already thought she was worthy of
>> consideration, not to the Nobel committee.
>>Why would they bother to even contact Pierre in the first place if she "was
>already well know for the work"?
To ask whether there was some reason she was NOT nominated for the
work that she was known for. (Indeed, since the letter did not
survive, we don't know whether he wrote to Pierre, or to both of them.
We know only that Pierre answered. But for reasons I discuss in the
next paragraph, I suspect he did indeed write only to Pierre.)
>If she was, they didn't need to ask Pierre what he thought of it.
You obviously do not understand 19th century European mores. In a
much more sexist society than we have today, I would suspect that
gentlemen did not write private letters to married women, and perhaps
even that French society would have demanded that Pierre speak for
both of them.
>And did he reply "oh, her work is VITAL, it would be
>a TRAVESTY to fail to award her the prize"? No, he inferred only that it
>would be "artistic".
The letter was written in French, so he would not use English idiom.
Are you such a master of the French language that you know that the
connotations of "artistic" in that context means that her work was
UNimportant? Rather, I suspect that the word "artistic" there means
something akin to what modern American would write in the same
position as "justice". For 20th century Americans "justice" is our
corresponding term for 19th century French "artistic".
>> >Marie's
>> >second prize for which the cited work was at best joint work with
>> >Pierre,
>>>> Actually, Pierre had NO part in that work
>>http://hum.amu.edu.pl/~zbzw/ph/sci/msc.htm>>You're leaving out a lot of names, not the least of whom is her own husband
>who made the MISTAKE of accepting the notion that "it would be more
>satisfying from the artistic point of view, if we were to be associated in
>this manner".
He was DEAD at the time of the second award which was for work that
was completed after he was dead.
>What does that mean? "Associated" in what manner? What's so "artistic"
>about naming a lab flunky on your half of a Nobel Prize?
Thereby showing that fail to understand why he used that word. You
have neither a sense of French culture nor a sense of irony.
>A scientist usually views the word "artistic" as a dirty word.
Really? How many scientists do you know?
Furthermore, in 19th century France, "artistic" would have been a high
compliment.
>Plus, they were married and would have shared the money anyway,
This was long before community property laws (and in a different
country to boot).
>and IF she
>was really a contributor to the research, then they could have thrown a
>party and told everybody.
They didn't need to (though they in fact did). She was already world
famous by the time the prize was awarded in 1903.
http://www.nobel.se/physics/articles/curie/index.html
>A little celebration in Marie's honour, was arranged in the evening by
> a research colleague, Paul Langevin. The guests included Jean Perrin,
> a prominent professor at the Sorbonne, and Ernest Rutherford, who was
> then working in Canada but temporarily in Paris and anxious to meet
> Marie Curie. He had good reason. His study of the deflection of
> radiation in magnetic fields had not met with success until he had
> been sent a strongly radioactive preparation by the Curies. By that time
> he was already famous and was soon to be considered as the greatest
> experimental physicist of the day.
Thus, even before the Nobel prize, famous scientists from around the
world were traveling to France to meet her. How many famous
scientists travel around the world to meet "lab flunkies"?
>Why should this prize have been split into fourths?
It wasn't. It was split in half, with the Curies getting half and
Becquerel getting the other half. The Nobel committee had already
awarded several split prizes, and in recent years MOST physics prizes
and chemistry prizes have been awarded, split 3 ways.
>To satisfy the feminazis?
The whole point of using Marie Curie as the example in this
discussion, you recall, was to go back to an era when, if there were
such a thing as "feminazis", they had no significant influence.
>Only for IDIOTS "like you who thing that one must" only be a woman to
>qualify for any special perk they demand. She was given a special privilege
>that no man ever got.
Which was?
>> To the rest of us, the fact that she overcame the anti-female bigotry
>> in an era when there was no "affirmative action", to become one of the
>> most highly recognized scientists in French history (even though she
>> was Polish by nationality), the fact that she overcame silly scandals
>> about her love life and went on to direct a major research institute
>> and to singlehandedly raise her daughter to be a Nobel-caliber
>> scientist, shows that her performance was unquestionably great.
>>And whose LIES were not discovered until the French realized they were two
>decades behind in nuclear research, and Prime Minister Georges Bidault
>removed her son-in-law without explanation from his position as high
>commissioner, and a few months later deprived Irene of her position as
>commissioner in the Commissariat a 1'Energie Atomique.
The sources I cited said that he was removed because he expressed
support for the Communist party. It is your invention that the French
"realized they were two decades behind in nuclear research". 6 years
before then, France had been ruled by the Nazis.
Furthermore, the French don't seem to have blamed either Marie Curie,
or her daughter for anything, since they are both honored, even though
Marie wasn't even native French.
The following must really grate on you:
http://www.nobel.se/physics/articles/curie/index.html
>Marie and Pierre Curie's pioneer research was again brought to mind
> when on April 20 last year, their bodies were taken from their place
> of burial at Sceaux, just outside Paris, and in a solemn ceremony
> were laid to rest under the mighty dome of the Panthéon. Marie Curie
> thus became the first woman to be accorded this mark of honour on her
> own merit. One woman, Sophie Berthelot, admittedly already rested
> there but in the capacity of wife of the chemist Marcelin Berthelot
> (1827-1907).
>>It was François Mitterrand who, before ending his fourteen-year-long
> presidency, took this initiative, as he said 'in order to finally
> respect the equality of women and men before the law and in reality'
> ('pour respecter enfin....l'égalité des femmes et des hommes dans le
> droit comme dans les faits'). In point of fact - as the press pointed
> out - this initiative was symbolic three times over. Marie Curie was
> a woman, she was an immigrant and she had to a high degree helped
> increase the prestige of France in the scientific world.
So much for the French blaming her for anything.
>> >Of course, favoritism to women is not the only factor, it's probably
>> >not even the dominant factor, but one shouldn't overlook it.
>>>> If anything, the "favoritism" was AGAINST women. When that happens,
>> it takes a truly superior talent to overcome the favoritism, and
>> sometimes it may even take an "advocate" asking a pointed question.
>>Or, it was because 32% of the responses of American 12th grade girls on
>TIMSS physics were not statistically significant,
How is this relevant to whether there was favoritism for or against
women on the Swedish Nobel committee in 1903?
>Where's the pony?
Where's the beef?
Nincompoop.
lojbab
