

Linus Torvalds for Nobel Peace Prize? - edw519
http://www.ridenbaugh.com/index.php/2009/11/18/a-northwest-nobel-option/

======
chasingsparks
I'm a big fan of Torvalds as a person and Linux as a movement. However, taking
intent of the peace prize in mind -- " _during the preceding year [...] shall
have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the
abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of
peace congresses._ " -- I don't really see his eligibility.

~~~
enntwo
It is a nice thought, but it does seem to not fall under the scope of the
prize.

It would probably make more sense to pursue the creation of a Nobel (or other
global prize) category for Compuational/Information Sciences. The impact of
progress in this field have just as much, if not more, of an effect on the
world today as the other Nobel fields (Chemsitry, Biology, etc.) Note: I am
not saying this is a realistic possibility, but it is probably more likely
than a computer scientist winning the peace prize.

It seems like there are plenty of people in the field (as well as other
Engineering related fields that are more relevant to the world now than they
were during the creation of the Nobel prizes) that justify a global
acknowledgement. Considering the importance of the internet in global daily
life, and the fact that now jQuery is used on 1/5th of the world's websites,
it seems Resig has had enough influence on the world to deserve metion too.
Remember, the Nobel prizes stress more recent accomplishments over past
successes.

~~~
acg
I understood that there is no Nobel prize for Mathematics, which computing is
considered an extension of. Nobel deliberately committed Mathematics. Would it
be wrong to add a Nobel award against Nobel's wishes?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize#Lack_of_a_Nobel_Pri...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize#Lack_of_a_Nobel_Prize_in_Mathematics)

~~~
henrikschroder
Well, the foundation that manages the prize money fund operate according to
the will of Alfred Nobel, and they can't add any prize.

However, you could do something like the economy prize which is actually
awarded by the Swedish national bank, and is "in memory of Alfred Nobel". It'd
be a bit more work to get such a new prize to be included among the others
though. You could try bribing the King of Sweden, it might work! :-)

------
markbnine
"Linux helped sequence the human genome, helps protect the world computer
infrastructure from viral attack, and is now the pathway for millions to learn
computer programming and participate in new international efforts"

Using this logic, Bill Gates should also be up for the award (and considering
his philanthropy, maybe he should).

There is a paradigm problem here. One does not award the builder of Mother
Teresa's orphanage a peace prize (even if it is quite nice). The award goes to
Mother Teresa.

~~~
adw
If the Gates Foundation nail malaria and other diseases of poverty then he
_should_.

~~~
pmjordan
I wouldn't really call malaria a "disease of poverty" - it's a bad idea to
take the most effective prophylactic indefinitely (it's an antibiotic), and it
can have plenty of side effects - and it's nowhere near 100% effective.
(coincidentally, I've been taking it for the last 3 weeks) So non-poor people
who live in affected regions can't keep on taking it either and therefore can
and do catch malaria. It is treatable if caught early enough (I guess this is
your poverty angle?) but anything but pleasant even if treatment is
successful. Moreover, once you've had it, it can come back anytime during the
rest of your life, rich or poor.

Of course, that makes it no less of a problem, and curing it once and for all
would certainly be prizeworthy.

------
michael_nielsen
Torvalds, Stallman, and Lessig would make an excellent combination, in my
opinion - they've done incredible things to expand the intellectual commons,
and that does great things for the "fraternity of nations". Think of all the
international friendships and other relationships maintained using open source
tools and the ideas of open culture.

The nomination process is described here:

<http://nobelprize.org/nomination/peace/>

~~~
a-priori
What I would like to see is it awarded to "the open source community" as a
whole, with that trio accepting it.

~~~
antonovka
Other than Lessig, that trio does not even begin to represent me or
innumerable other open source developers. RMS and Linus represent GPL and
Linux developers, who are are only one component of the broader community.

The GPL/Linux ideals are clearly and fundamentally opposed to my own, and I
would be insulted if RMS and Linus accepted the award on behalf of the open
source community at large.

------
gtt
IMO, Stallman should be nominated too.

~~~
jff
You're right--Gore started the job of devaluing the prizes, now we just have
to give one to Stallman and nobody will ever care about the Nobel Prize again.

~~~
omouse
Without RMS there might not be a GPL nor Linux licensed under the GPL. There
would probably be no open source movement either because it relies on free
software.

So you can stop with the insults now.

~~~
holdenk
The thing is there are a lot of GPL-like licenses. Linux might have ended up
under a BSD-style license rather than a GPL license. While things certainly
would have been different, I'm not convinced they would have been worse.

The assertion that there would be no open source movement without RMS is a bit
difficult to believe, unless we are going for a very narrow definition of open
source.

~~~
prodigal_erik
Linux under BSDL? We already know how that would end. We'd lose half a
generation's best work because it's trapped in the wreckage of vendors' failed
proprietary forks.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_wars>

~~~
antonovka
Your argument makes the unfounded assumption that those vendors would have
done the work you "lost" if the code had been GPL licensed.

As a counterpoint, FreeBSD has progressed at a steady clip -- I fail to see
how it is significantly behind Linux, and is significantly ahead in many
areas.

~~~
Aegean
It falls behind by not being as popular. I think this is not a result of BSD
being inferior, it's just how things came into being. I don't have numbers on
BSD developers or the rate of improvement, but I guess one reason for it is
that BSD license put off more developers compared to GPLv2.

~~~
ilkhd2
So do you think that success of MacOS X (derived from FreeBSD)does not show
benefitsof BSD model? Or Microsoft's use of NetBSD? And also, many developers
put off by GPL( I am for example),

The objective reasons for being not as popular I think, that FreeBSD never
positioned itself as a desktop system, and many small things (such as how fast
it boots) are neglected. Yet, overall simplicity and order is attractive to
me; a lo easier to understand internals IMHO.

~~~
prodigal_erik
What's the benefit? The users are still running proprietary software, and the
vendor is still confined to the same 10% or so of the computer market.

------
motters
It's not at all clear to me that when Torvalds started Linux he was
necessarily trying to advance world peace. His motivations seem to have been
much more practical and somewhat self motivated (scratching a personal itch).
If they're handing out prizes Richard Stallman might be a better candidate,
since his motives were explicitly altruistic from the outset (advancing
freedom for computer users).

------
Aegean
RMS and Torvalds should share the prize. RMS deserves it since he's the
founder of the idea of free software, and Torvalds deserves it because based
on the idea he created a collaborative movement of exceptional engineering.

------
henrikschroder
Yes, the peace prize has sometimes gone to controversial or unexpected people,
but that doesn't mean the process is completely without rules. First, these
people can nominate for the peace prize:

[http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/who-
ca...](http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/who-can-
nominate/)

If you're not on that list, sending Norwegian Ubuntu CDs to the members of the
Norwegian Nobel Committee as the article suggests is going to achieve
absolutely nothing.

Second, read the actual will of Alfred Nobel:

<http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/alfred-nobel/testament/>

"and one part to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for
fraternity between the nations and the abolition or reduction of standing
armies and the formation and spreading of peace congresses"

Does Linus Torvalds fit that description? Not even remotely close. If the
author of the article had spent a few more minutes actually researching the
rules, and not just browsing Wikipedia, he could have avoided writing the
thing altogether.

~~~
mieses
so what. they stopped following those rules a long time ago. regardless,
torvalds would decline since he seems to have integrity.

------
zandorg
I think some people see the Nobel as "Awards for great things", but really it
hasn't caught up with the times. Politics is also involved. So it's "Awards
for whoever they THINK has done great things" - also bound by categories which
don't even include mathematics (the non-Nobel/pseudo prize is for
Economics)...

------
mdemare
Linus deserves a Nobel Prize, but he likes flamewars way too much to get the
Peace Prize. How about literature? Why should that be limited to writers of
human languages?

------
DenisM
Well, that would make for one awkward acceptance speech. If you've seen Linus
giving presentation you can imagine...

~~~
pmjordan
He'd certainly start by insulting everyone not using git...

------
standalonematt
What about the economics prize (I know, not a real nobel prize) going to
members of the free/open source software community. Their works have really
shown that great things can be built by a community of people, with limited
central leadership and without a clear profit motive.

~~~
philwelch
The economics prize usually goes to an economist, not to someone who actually
demonstrates something about the economy in practice.

~~~
standalonematt
Thanks for that - I don't really know much about the criteria for awarding the
economics prize.

------
nzmsv
Linus deserves this way more than Obama does. Why? Because you don't give
prizes for expected good work. You give a prize looking back on what's been
accomplished.

I think this nomination will help inspire the next generation of young
hackers, and I say go for it.

------
mahmud
"benevolent dictator"?

------
known
RMS is not as _diplomatic_ as Linus.

------
ajaimk
He has my vote if that matters.

------
omouse
Disgusting. If anything, Richard Stallman should be nominated for it as he has
done far more and the Free Software movement is much more in line with the
intent of the Nobel Peace Prize.

~~~
mieses
i would agree with you. stallman is a better fit for a nobel. he's such an
inspiration. torvalds just works hard, which is so trivial and boring.

~~~
igorgue
to be fair... both work hard

~~~
selven
What he's saying is that Linus is a more behind-the-scenes person, not a
public figure (although he does make quite a few controversial forum posts).
RMS is out there, at the front, campaigning for his ideals.

~~~
whatusername
Maybe it's because I'm up late - but I read sarcasm in that post.. RMS talks a
lot (similar perhaps to the latest Nobel prize winner* (nominated 8 days into
office)), whereas Linus gets stuff done.

~~~
selven
That's essentially what I said, just the bias is swapped.

------
rmason
I twittered that Linus is more deserving of a Nobel than either Obama or
Carter.

But Ronald Reagan though freed something like 125 million people and he never
received it.

Bill Clinton single handedly has raised over a billion dollars for the third
world poor and he hasn't received it.

~~~
diego_moita
> But Ronald Reagan though freed something like 125 million people and he
> never received it.

No, he didn't. Gorbachev did.

