Franchu’s lair

I was driving to some relaxing holidays in France when I heard it in the news. Al Gore had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize!

For me Nobel prizes represented the utmost distinction a person could be awarded to recognize his lifelong achievements and contributions to a certain field. I often don’t understand why they award the literature prizes to some of the authors, but I don’t think I am qualified to bring my opinion in that particular case.

For the physics and chemistry prizes, even if I cannot fully understand the contributions that have led to the award, I can see the importance of those contributions and how it has shaped the current world. Just in case you didn’t notice, Nobel Prizes are normally awarded to old people for things they did a long time ago. Well, I guess it just makes it easier to get it right

If you think of the Nobel Peace prize, it is awarded to people or organizations that have contributed somehow to maintain the peace in the world. Some selected examples that I took from the Nobel Peace prize website:

# 2005 - International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei
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# 2001 - United Nations, Kofi Annan
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# 1999 - Médecins Sans Frontières
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# 1997 - International Campaign to Ban Landmines, Jody Williams
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# 1994 - Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin
# 1993 - Nelson Mandela, F.W. de Klerk
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# 1990 - Mikhail Gorbachev
# 1989 - The 14th Dalai Lama
# 1988 - United Nations Peacekeeping Forces
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# 1985 - International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War
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# 1981 - Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
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# 1979 - Mother Teresa
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# 1977 - Amnesty International
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# 1969 - International Labour Organization
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# 1965 - United Nations Children’s Fund
# 1964 - Martin Luther King
# 1963 - International Committee of the Red Cross, League of Red Cross Societies
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# 1954 - Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
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# 1944 - International Committee of the Red Cross
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Each of those organizations or individuals have contributed somehow to peace and have help different people to understand each other. Each of them is relevant in the modern history of the world.

If you compare all those names to the winner of this year, I can just be sad because one of the institutions that had earned its respect has suddenly lost it. Can you tell me what Al Gore has done to deserve a Nobel Peace Price? In order to avoid environmentalists crucifying me for raising doubts about global warming, let’s leave it out of the discussion. I will just say that for me, global warming is still a controversial issue as there is still no wide consensus among the scientific community (did you read scientific community?) that the catastrophic worst case scenarios are going to happen, and for sure not in a 5 to 10 years time frame that some people are interested in promoting. That is why I still think that much of the current hype just follows a political agenda that needs to be promoted, but that is another topic.

What I cannot understand is how they can give this prize to a politician for having made a movie last year?!?!? In which way global warming is related with world peace? Oh, I see, if the seas are rising people will fight for their lands, and that is why making a movie is going to solve all those problems. Well… as I said before, they normally give the Nobel Prizes for lifetime achievements that have impacted history. I don’t see how any of the scenarios of the movie have become a reality to show its accuracy, or how the movie has averted a conflict. When that happens, give him the Nobel Prize, until then… the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize is a joke.

Would you award Einstein the Nobel Peace Prize because thanks to his work in nuclear bombs WWII was ended and peace was achieved? I know that I wouldn’t but he for sure merits the Noble Physics Prize.

With all due respect to the IPCC who share this award with Mr. Gore, I still don’t think they deserve the Nobel Peace Prize. If their findings are proven true by history, they will deserve the Physics Nobel or the Chemistry Nobel… but not the Peace Nobel.

If you want to read some other reactions to this award, the BBC has published some high profile reactions. At least I am happy to see that I am not the only person that thinks that this prize is ridiculous and outrageous.

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