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Just curious, do we have any Nobel prize winner on this SE?

PS: I want to follow some big shots, or the topics they are interested in.

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  • $\begingroup$ Wasn't Parisi around? Or is it not the real Parisi? $\endgroup$
    – Mauricio
    Feb 9 at 15:49

3 Answers 3

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Sorta. Gerard ’t Hooft has an account here and has answered a few questions (16, according to his profile). However, he hasn't been very active lately, last stopping by back in February 2014.

If there are others, I'm not aware of them (or they're not making themselves known).

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  • $\begingroup$ Thank you. Any other big figures that I could follow? :) $\endgroup$
    – Daniel
    Dec 2, 2014 at 3:08
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    $\begingroup$ @Daniel: As far as I know, there isn't a way to "follow" a particular user. You can sort through the users page to see the members in descending order of rep or peruse the most-used question tags to see what's the most common one. $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Dec 2, 2014 at 3:21
  • $\begingroup$ Okay, thank you Kyle. $\endgroup$
    – Daniel
    Dec 2, 2014 at 3:26
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    $\begingroup$ @KyleKanos There are RSS feeds for users. Look at the bottom right of their profile page. $\endgroup$
    – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten
    Dec 2, 2014 at 4:20
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    $\begingroup$ @dmckee: Well look at that. Learn something new every day! $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Dec 2, 2014 at 4:21
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    $\begingroup$ Yeah, though SE intentionally makes it somewhat difficult to follow a particular user or single out their posts (in the sense that the RSS feeds are not well publicized). The (or, a) point of the SE model is that it's about the content, not the users. $\endgroup$
    – David Z
    Dec 2, 2014 at 5:30
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    $\begingroup$ @Daniel Also be aware that going through a user's post from their profile and upvoting a bunch of them may trigger an anti-serial-voting algorithm which will cancel the votes (see here for more information). $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Dec 2, 2014 at 11:55
  • $\begingroup$ It is possible to follow users through some custom script-thingies $\endgroup$
    – Danu
    Dec 4, 2014 at 8:56
  • $\begingroup$ Here is the question he answered the question asking about his own model. I don't understand anything :D $\endgroup$
    – Ooker
    Dec 7, 2014 at 5:38
  • $\begingroup$ Wow @Ooker, nice find. I didn't understand the physics of the question but I understood the unfortunate end to the discussion. $\endgroup$
    – rob Mod
    Dec 8, 2014 at 22:08
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Peter Shor has an active account (as of this posting). He's not a Nobel prize winner but he developed/has a famous quantum algorithm named after him, which I think qualifies him as a "big shot."

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    $\begingroup$ I was actually quite surprised when I saw him answer a question about Shor's algorithm on here. $\endgroup$
    – chbaker0
    Dec 4, 2014 at 3:41
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    $\begingroup$ Another nice answer by Shor is this one - not on this site but on TCS. $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Dec 4, 2014 at 10:50
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    $\begingroup$ @mebob maybe I'm just old fashioned, but I think if Peter Shor answers a question about Shor's algorithm, that should automatically be the accepted answer. Not saying it wasn't accepted, I have no idea. I'm just opining $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 4, 2014 at 14:03
  • $\begingroup$ @Jim i think the whole point here is that individuals dont get that kinda preference, they get rated based on the usefulness of their answers. $\endgroup$
    – Math chiller
    Dec 8, 2014 at 5:44
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    $\begingroup$ @tryingToGetProgrammingStraight That's how the vote system works, sure. But the accepted answer should be the most correct answer. And I think Peter Shor could give the most correct answer about Shor's algorithm $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 8, 2014 at 14:05
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    $\begingroup$ @Jim how do you figure? $\endgroup$
    – user12029
    Dec 9, 2014 at 1:44
  • $\begingroup$ @NeuroFuzzy I don't understand the question. Are you asking me how I came to the conclusion that the person who developed an algorithm could give the most correct answer to a question about it? Whether I'm right or wrong, I'd think my process of reasoning on that was fairly self-evident $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 9, 2014 at 12:37
  • $\begingroup$ @Jim it was a dumb dry joke! s228.photobucket.com/user/simoniisays/media/… $\endgroup$
    – user12029
    Dec 9, 2014 at 20:51
  • $\begingroup$ @NeuroFuzzy That's my new favourite joke! $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 10, 2014 at 14:22
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This place is teeming with physics Nobel prize winners. But except for Prof. 't Hooft who won the prize in the past, they will win it in the future.

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    $\begingroup$ That's very optimistic of you. But of all the physicists I know personally, only two or three are contributors on this site. That would indicate that a small percentage of physicists also contribute here. So the odds, while non-zero, are small that a large number of future Nobel Prize winners are part of this site as of now. $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 12, 2014 at 15:12
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    $\begingroup$ @Jim When they were still studying there was no internet. The typical person who becomes a big name in physics will be interested in this subject already at a very young age, he/she would try to study the subject well ahead of the school curriculum. In the old days that meant going to the library, some of them would manage to get so far ahead in school that they could go to university at a young age. Today, things are different. Text books are one Google search away, and they become more accessible due to Wikipedia and other online resources. $\endgroup$
    – Count Iblis
    Dec 12, 2014 at 17:35
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    $\begingroup$ I read and use Wikipedia, but I don't edit the pages or write new ones. Nothing says the future winners won't utilise this site, but the odds are still not in the favour that we are currently teeming with future winners as users $\endgroup$
    – Jim
    Dec 12, 2014 at 17:37
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    $\begingroup$ There is also a social aspect to this. Social media is a great tool for such children who are ahead and stackexchange is a very prominent website dedicated to precisley the topics that they are interested in. Stuck computing the photon propagator to two loops? Where better to discuss this than here! $\endgroup$
    – Count Iblis
    Dec 12, 2014 at 17:45
  • $\begingroup$ @CountIblis Problems with that: Stack Exchange is not social media, and that question would get closed in a heartbeat. $\endgroup$
    – Ryan Unger
    Oct 27, 2015 at 23:33
  • $\begingroup$ @0celo7 If someone makes an attempt to calculate something and gets stuck then that is a legitimate question for this site. There are many books online, but you learn mostly from doing the hard exercises in the books. I've noted that there are quite a few teenagers between the ages of 14 and 18 here studying advanced subjects and getting help with problems here. Some of them may already be studying at university, but most children who are way ahead in physics will not be able to go to university (e.g. they may not be far enough ahead in all other subjects). $\endgroup$
    – Count Iblis
    Oct 27, 2015 at 23:59
  • $\begingroup$ @CountIblis "If someone makes an attempt to calculate something and gets stuck then that is a legitimate question for this site." Actually, no. There has to be conceptual issue that is clearly laid out in the post. Straightforward computation is off-topic. (And until recently I was one of your teenagers.) $\endgroup$
    – Ryan Unger
    Oct 28, 2015 at 0:12

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