Under a cloud of bloodshed, war, the refugee crisis, hunger, and artificial intelligence might all be honored when the Nobel Prize announcements start next week.
The attacks on Israel, spearheaded by Hamas, which marked the start of a year filled with violence and carnage throughout the Middle East, fall on October 7, the same day as the prize week.
The Nobel Prizes in science and literature can be exempt. However, if the peace prize is given out at all, it will do so in an environment where global violence is on the rise and honors efforts to put an end to warfare.
“I look at the world and see so much conflict, hostility, and confrontation that I wonder if this is the year the Nobel Peace Prize should be withheld,” said Dan Smith, director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Smith mentions the turmoil in the Middle East, the current crisis in Ukraine, the war in Sudan and the potential for famine there, and studies from his institution indicating that military spending worldwide is rising at the quickest rate since World War II.
According to Smith, “it could go to some groups that are marginalized despite their heroic efforts.” However, the tendency is not in the right way. Maybe it would be appropriate to highlight it by delaying the awarding of the peace prize for this year.
It is not new to withhold the Nobel Peace Prize. There have been 19 suspensions in the past, including ones that occurred during world wars. It was not given out in 1972, the most recent instance.
But according to Henrik Urdal, head of Oslo’s Peace Research Institute, withdrawal would be a mistake in 2024, saying the prize is “arguably more important as a way to promote and recognize important work for peace.”
The Norwegian Nobel Committee is set to announce the Nobel Peace Prize, which will recognize civil grassroot groups and international organizations working to mitigate violence in the Middle East.
The announcements will begin with the physiology or medicine prize, followed by physics, chemistry, literature, and peace awards. The Nobel Committee will announce the Peace Prize on Friday, while the other categories will be announced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
The prize in economics will be announced the following week on October 14. New technology, possibly artificial intelligence, could also be recognized in one or more categories. Critics of AI warn that the rise of autonomous weapons could lead to additional peace-shattering misery.
However, AI has also enabled scientific breakthroughs that are tipped for recognition in other categories. David Pendlebury, head of research analysis at Clarivate’s Institute for Scientific Information, suggests that scientists from Google Deepmind, the AI lab, could be among those under consideration for the chemistry prize.
AlphaFold, the company’s artificial intelligence, accurately predicts protein structure and is widely used in various fields, including medicine, where it could one day be used to develop a breakthrough drug.
(AP)
