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Comment by oh_sigh | Hacker News Reader

Really? In my mind the Peace Prize gets the top billing.

If I knew someone had a Nobel prize in economics, I would think they were really smart, and really deep into economics. If I knew someone had a Nobel Peace prize, it's almost certain that they did something of extreme first hand importance to the lives of many.

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Publicity is different from prestige and reputation. The Peace prize has received publicity from controversies.

Peace prize has been given people who don't deserve it. President Obama was nominated less than two weeks in office and received it after less than nine months in the office. The prize was seen more as criticism of Bush administration than awarding Obama.

Obama said he didn't deserve the prize, and everyone agrees. It's more fair to look at the long history of recipients (MLK, Mandela, Mother Teresa) than to judge the prize on one or two errors. Otherwise, almost all prizes are meaningless.

Personally, I wouldn't include Mother Teresa in a list of examples of people who deserved it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Mother_Teresa

on one or two errors?

Kissinger, Moniz, Briand, Obama, Mother Theresa, Kim Dae-jung.

To save others the confusion, Moniz didn't win Peace but the "Physiology or Medicine" prize for inventing lobotomies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize_controversies

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize_controversies#Peac...

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