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?

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

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

[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.

Gun owners, imagine if an attacker comes to your home and takes your gun to use against you before you had the chance to pick it up. Would you regret owning a gun?

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

Why wait any longer for the one you love?

^† They rationalise their decision thusly:

J.K. Rowling said that 65% of people in Britain are transgender. Where did she come up with that statistic?

You can have your cake and eat it too

Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

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

Have you ever had sex with your female cousin? How did it start?

(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)

"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?"

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

Is the media protecting Kamala Harris?

Whatever.

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

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

How do I stop my 12-year-old daughter from crying herself to sleep? I have punished her and she still does it.

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

When he's standing, in front of you

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

I want to have anal sex, but my wife refuses. What do I do?

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:

My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.

There you go.^†

If a cat is feminine in German, what article do you give to a male cat?

(Mumbles of assent)

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.

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

What is the meanest thing your husband has said to you?

Whatever.

[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."

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

Forget drones, Amazon has new robots that could replace humans - TheStreet