Discovery or invention': the case for recalibrating the Nobel Prize for Physics

• Author: Örjan Strandberg
• Position: Spokesman of the Swedish National Innovators Council and Chair of the Stockholm Innovators Association, Stockholm, Sweden
• Pages: 42-44

42 June 2019

“Discovery or

invention”: the case

for recalibrating the

Nobel Prize for Physics

By Örjan Strandberg , Spokesman of the Swedish Nat ional

Innovators Cou ncil and Chair of the Sto ckholm Innovators

Association , Stockholm, Sweden

Most countries in the world agre e that inventions and innovations are prere quisites for

every nation’s industrial and societal growth and welfare. Intellectua l property laws are

the most important in centive for encouraging innovation and creativity. These laws rec-

ognize and reward inventors and ensure so ciety benets from inventions.

The other importan t motivator for invention and innovation is society’s general encour age-

ment and acknowledgement of the inventor, both politically and socially, via the media,

through awards and stipends, for exam ple.

Arguably, the most important inter national award for inventors should have been the

Nobel Prize for Physics. However, that prize, for reasons we will explain, has, over time,

come to be perceived as the world’s most prestigious science prize and is no longer

specically associated with invention.

That all nations need a rich a nd continuous ow of skilled researchers and scientis ts is

a given. But this should not detract from the equally important need for ingenious in-

ventors and their inventions. Histor y shows us that inventors are the main originators of

technological, industrial and societal growth. In Sweden, for example, a report entitled,

Where did Sweden’s Top 100 Innovations originate? by the Swedish innovation researcher

Dr. Christian Sandström, shows that at least 80 percent of inventions originate from

outside academia.

Over the last three decades, p ersuasive theories have circulated among politi cal leaders,

suggesting that the scienti c community can replace the inventor community. This has

resulted in a measurable de cline in government funding for inventions in the industrial