Former Google researcher Geoffrey Hinton, meanwhile, won the Nobel prize for physics on Tuesday, alongside US scientist John Hopfield, for earlier discoveries in machine learning that paved the way for the AI boom.

 

“The Nobel prize committee doesn’t want to miss out on this AI stuff, so it’s very creative of them to push Geoffrey through the physics route,” she said. “I would argue both are dubious, but nonetheless worthy of a Nobel prize in terms of the science they’ve done. So how else are you going to reward them?” Noah Giansiracusa, an associate maths professor at Bentley University and author of “How Algorithms Create and Prevent Fake News”, also argued that Hinton’s win was questionable.

 

“What he did was phenomenal, but was it physics? I don’t think so. Even if there’s inspiration from physics, they’re not developing a new theory in physics or solving a longstanding problem in physics.”

 

The Nobel prize categories for achievements in medicine or physiology, physics, chemistry, literature and peace were laid down in the will of Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1895. The prize for economics is a later addition established with an endowment from the Swedish central bank in 1968.

 

Dominance

Regulators in the US are currently circling Google for a potential break-up, which could force it to divest parts of its business, such as its Chrome browser and Android operating system, which some argue allow it to maintain an illegal monopoly in online search.

 

The profits derived from its leading position have allowed Google and other Big Tech companies to outpace traditional academia in publishing groundbreaking AI research.

 

Hinton himself has expressed some regrets about his life’s work, quitting Google last year so that he could speak freely about the dangers of AI, and warning that computers could become smarter than people far sooner than previously expected.

 

Speaking at a press conference Tuesday, he said: “I wish I had a sort of simple recipe that if you do this, everything’s going to be okay, but I don’t, in particular with respect to the existential threat of these things getting out of control and taking over.”

 

When he quit Google in 2023 over his AI concerns, Hinton said the company itself acted very responsibly.

 

For some, this week’s Nobel prize wins underscore how hard it is becoming for traditional academia to compete. Giansiracusa told Reuters there was a need for greater public investment in research.

 

First Published: Oct 10 2024 | 3:03 PM IST