Live data from Hacker News

Jewish Nobel Laureates

en.wikipedia.org

1–10 of 82 posts

Re: Jewish Nobel Laureates

#9
By the way, has anyone come up with a possible explanation for the seemingly disproportionate number of Jewish laureates and smart people in general? Do Jews have some tradition or belief that's helpful in this?

Re: Jewish Nobel Laureates

#10
While this is an interesting statistic, it can be interpreted in many ways, not all of which are meaningful.

Statistically, more men have won Nobel prizes than women (by a large margin). Most Nobel laureates are Caucasian. Most are from the western hemisphere. Other than gender, it may be interpreted to mean that if a group which makes a small fraction of the total world population, they must be better/smarter.

It's a fallacious argument of course, since there can be many other factors at play here. How much of it is because these groups have access to more funds, that most of them are based in the United States which has better and more well-funded universities? What about social factors that have nothing to do with race/religion?

Along these lines, I could submit a link about how Indians who make up a tiny fraction of the American population are so much more successful than $POPULATION [1], but it's a meaningless statistic to have, other than for some misplaced pride.

1. http://www.forbes.com/2009/02/24/bobby-jindal-indian-america...

Post reply on HN