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?

My 11 million SEK, Dr Jo.

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

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

What are the legal obligations of a new homeowner if the previous owner leaves furniture in the house after moving out?

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

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.

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

Musk's DOGE workers are now investigating Medicare and Medicaid. They want to eliminate fraud, but can they also be hurting poor Americans and senior citizens' benefits?

(Bob Dylan, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2016)

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:

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

Why are so many people anti-Trump? People didn't like Obama either, but he was the president, so people didn't do this. What makes Trump different?

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

When he's standing, in front of you

Whatever.

Jamie Dimon: The economy could ‘deteriorate’ soon - CNN

Why wait any longer for the one you love?

^† They rationalise their decision thusly:

Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

What should a young woman do to control sagging breasts?

Whatever.

There you go.^†

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

Do you like high heels?

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

[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."

(Mumbles of assent)

I have a bad reputation and need help. What should I do?

[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.

You can have your cake and eat it too

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

What baseball stories from the early days of the sport seem too bizarre to be true?

"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?"

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

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

What's the biggest myth about illegal immigrants?