Nobel Prize's three-person rule perpetuates 'lone genius' myth, says biologist

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This week, the Nobel committee handed out prizes for physics, chemistry and medicine. If you were paying attention, you may have noticed that in the science categories, the prizes were each shared by three people.

• Nobel Prize in Physics goes to gravitational wave scientists
• Nobel Prize in Medicine goes to 3 U.S.-born scientists
• Nobel Prize in Chemistry shared by 3 for cryo-electron microscopy

The Nobel Foundation's rules say that the prize cannot be divided between more than three people. But Jenny Rohn, a cell biologist at University College London, has a problem with that. She's written a column in The Guardian called "The problem with Nobel Prizes and the myth of the lone genius."

Rohn spoke with As it Happens about her concerns. Here's part of her conversation with host Carol Off.

What's wrong with the way the Nobel committee gives out science prizes?

Limiting the number of people who discover something to only three — and moreover to only three people who are alive — is a little bit limiting in my view.

Who should it include?

The thing about science is that it is a collective endeavour and it is often very difficult to ascribe one major discovery to only three people — and often it's quite controversial the three people who are chosen.

Why do you think the Nobel committee is so given to having these kind of individuals who stand as geniuses in the world?

It is very strange because the Peace Prize, which is also administered by the Nobel committee, is happy to recognize organizations on occasion. But for some reason, for the science prizes, they don't do this.

"It's like we need a poster child for discovery.... This is always going to end up limiting reality.- Jenny Rohn

I think it's because human beings are hardwired to want to digest the world in stories, in narrative.

I think that people view science as being this epic struggle with heroes, and winners, and losers. It is like a mythology, I think.… It's clearly more compelling to say, "These three people discovered gravitational waves," than to say this was a process that began many many decades ago. Thousands of people contributed over the years. They're not all alive anymore. Some of them had major roles. Some of them had minor roles.

It's like we need a poster child for discovery. We need a face to pin the discovery on. This is always going to end up limiting reality. This is not how it really happens.

So in science, the successes are buoyed up on the shoulders of many, many people.

This is true and it's often not the shoulders of giants, like Newton said. It's often the shoulders of very small, you might say, insignificant people. There's the technicians who run the machinery. There's the students and post-docs that do the bulk of the work.

The bulk of science work is done by very young people on short term contracts — trainees, apprentices. They're usually not very well paid. The job prospects in science are not very good. The vast majority of people in science won't end up being a professor even if they want to be.

This attraction of this sort of "great scientist" mythology, is that why there are so few women who win the prizes?

Obviously, the Nobel Prize is delayed quite significantly. It takes many many decades, usually, before you're recognized. Back in the day, there weren't as many women.

But I think now, we've come to the point where more women should be nominated and win the prize and they aren't winning. I don't know. Maybe women aren't standing up to take the credit like they should. If you think you've discovered something, maybe a man is more likely to crow about it and become known for that thing — whereas a woman might say, "Well, you know, I did this but I had lots of help."

Should we just get rid of the prize all together?

Well, I don't want to diss the Nobel too much. I mean I think it's an interesting idea. But I do think particularly in this day and age of really big projects, big collaborative international research … it would be great if the Nobel committee could consider teams and give the Nobel to, for example, the whole team who discovered gravitational waves. It's a named group — it's LIGO, and there are 1,000 people in that group. If the Peace Prize can be given to an organization, why can't the scientific prizes? 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. To hear more from Jenny Rohn, listen to the audio above.