Sunday, September 2, 2012

Distinguished Lists


If I Ran the National Endowment of the Arts

The highest award bestowed by the nation on an artist. Rather inconsistent, compared to when achievements took place: Aretha Franklin got hers before Bob Dylan, Wynton Marsalis before Sonny Rollins, Ray Bradbury before Harper Lee. Here’s who I would give it to for 2012:

Sid Caesar, Television pioneer and comedian (88 years old)
Gary Snyder, Poet (82 years old)
Toni Morrison, Novelist (81 years old)
Gordon Willis, Cinematographer (81 years old)
Oscar de la Renta, Fashion designer (80 years old)
Wayne Shorter, Jazz saxophonist (79 years old)
Philip Glass, Composer (75 years old)
Carollee Schneemann, Performance artist (72 years old)
Liza Minnelli, Actress and singer (66 years old)
Annie Leibovitz, Photographer (62 years old)

2012 Nobel Prize Predictions

They're a month away!

Physics – 2:1 odds on Peter Higgs
Literature – 3:1 odds on Haruki Murakami, BONUS: 6:1 odds on Bob Dylan
Peace – 3:1 odds on Mursi, El-Keib, and Jebali, individually or any combination thereof
Chemistry – 7:1 odds on Richard Zare or W.E. Moerner, or combination
Physiology – 5:1 odds on Joseph Vacanti and Robert Langer

American Scientists Who Should Have Statues Made of Them

Sometimes a statue is needed. Only those without statues were considered (unlike Goddard, Millikan, Tesla, the Wrights, etc.) Maybe we could have these guys in the Capitol? Or a science park?

Jonas Salk – Cured Polio
Linus Pauling – Chemist and Peace Advocate
Thomas Hunt Morgan – Geneticist
Edwin Hubble – Cosmologist
Gregory Pincus and Margaret Sanger – Contraceptive Pill and Revolutionary
Rachel Carson – Environmentalist
Willis Carrier – Air Conditioning
Richard Feynman – Physicist
John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, William Shockley – Pioneers of the Information Age
Glenn Seaborg – Chemist
Willard Libby – Radiocarbon Dating


1 comment:

Karen said...

I'm pretty sure that having a giant telescope named after you counts as a memorial....