Training the Heavens

Chapter 276 I Have to Give
Judging from the results of the Nobel Prize awards in later generations, not to mention the Economics Prize, the Peace Prize and the Literature Prize are naturally influenced by various political factors and have almost become a platform for Europe and the United States to show political correctness.

Even natural science awards such as physics, chemistry, biology and medicine have been affected to a certain extent. If Zhang Xingjiu plans to win an award, he must face these problems.

First, there's the issue of race. Racial discrimination has always existed in Europe and the United States, even in later generations. How much more so now? The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and with a panel of mostly white people, they're bound to favor their own race.

So since the Nobel Prize in Physics began to be awarded, the winners in the first thirty years were basically all from Europe and the United States. It was not until 1930 that India's Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman became the first non-European and American scholar to win the prize.

But everyone knows the relationship between India and Britain, and Raman was already a fellow of the Royal Society of London before winning the award, and he also received a British title.

Going back further in time, in 1949, Japanese physicist Hideki Yukawa won the award. He was a scholar trained in Japan, but he became a visiting professor at Princeton University the year before the award. It is hard to say that his winning was not influenced by this factor.

Zhang Xingjiu is currently studying in France, which is slightly better than being of purely Chinese descent. However, this does not guarantee that France will help him win awards. They will definitely give priority to scholars who are purely of their own country.

There are also many scholars in France who are qualified to win the award, such as Lippmann, Becquerel who discovered natural radioactivity, and Pierre Curie. Perhaps France will only consider helping Zhang Xingjiu after they have won the award.

The second is the political impact. In a few years, China will face one of the greatest humiliations in modern times. The Eight-Nation Alliance will attack China. China and France have become hostile countries, and they will be even less likely to help Zhang Xingjiu.

Although Sweden did not directly participate in the war, they would definitely stand on the side of these invaders and would not award Zhang Xingjiu.

Coupled with factors such as personal connections and circle influence, even if Zhang Xingjiu has made achievements worthy of the Nobel Prize, it will be very difficult for him to win the prize.

The discovery of electrons and the impact of blackbody radiation experiments are both achievements worthy of Nobel Prizes, but now and in the future, there are still many achievements of similar levels. If people don't give Zhang Xingjiu the award, Zhang Xingjiu will have no good solution.

Because these two achievements do not have an overwhelming advantage compared with the contributions of Marconi, Roentgen, the Curies, Lorentz and others.

By then, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences would have sufficient reasons to postpone the award for ten years, or even twenty or thirty years. However, by then, it would be hard to say how useful this thing would be to Zhang Xingjiu.

So it’s better to get it as soon as possible. Zhang Xingjiu has already thought of a strategy. At worst, I can snatch all the achievements of the first few Nobel Prize winners in physics and make sure the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences doesn’t give it to me.

The most important thing for any award at the beginning is to establish prestige. The Physics Prize is intended to reward scientists who have made outstanding contributions to the field of human physics. If Zhang Xingjiu's achievements are obviously much higher than other scholars and he has become a figure that other physicists cannot avoid in their research, if he is not given the award, the academic community will question the fairness of the award.

But we can't just copy randomly. Just like the previous idea, we should give priority to the theoretical field and not easily involve the application field. Even if we must involve it, it is best to be like doing cathode ray experiments, with only a short lead.

Otherwise, given Europe and the US's industrial advantages, they would undoubtedly be the first to initiate large-scale industrial applications. Zhang Xingjiu's inventions would widen the gap between Europe and the US and China, and he would become a historical sinner. With this principle in mind, Zhang Xingjiu directly used his memory to filter the achievements of the first few Nobel Prize winners in physics.

The first winner was Roentgen from Germany. He won the award alone in 1901 for his discovery of X-rays. This is a bit of a pity. When he discovered X-rays, Zhang Xingjiu was still studying at Xuhui Public School and did not have sufficient experimental conditions to snatch the award.

Then came Lorentz and Zeeman. Lorentz successfully explained the magnetic splitting of atomic spectra recently discovered by Zeeman using electron theory.

Lorentz concluded that the phenomenon was caused by the vibration of negative electrons in atoms. The charge-to-mass ratio of negative electrons that he derived theoretically was consistent with the results obtained by Thomson from cathode ray experiments the following year. For the discovery and explanation of the Zeeman effect, Lorentz and Zeeman shared the 1902 Nobel Prize in Physics.

The experiment has now been completed, and the paper explaining Lorentz's explanation has been published, so Zhang Xingjiu has no way to snatch it away.

The third winners were Becquerel and the Curies. The former had already completed his experiment, and the latter two had a good relationship with Zhang Xingjiu and were embarrassed to snatch the prize. Moreover, purifying radioactive materials was very dangerous, and Zhang Xingjiu valued his life more and did not intend to get involved.

The fourth winner was British scientist John William Stratford, who won the award for his measurements of the densities of important gases and the discovery of argon from these studies, achievements he made more than ten years ago.

By the fifth session, Zhang Xingjiu finally found a suitable target. The winner this time was Philip Lenard, professor of theoretical physics at Heidelberg University. Like Perrin, Wien, Thomson and others, he confirmed that cathode rays are composed of negatively charged particles. However, Lenard published "On the Electrostatic Properties of Cathode Rays" in 1898, which gave him priority for this discovery and won the award.

Now Zhang Xingjiu has also completed a similar experiment and used a paper to prove the existence of electrons, snatching the opportunity from the sixth winner Thomson. Next, he only needs to slightly change the experimental plan, accurately measure the electrostatic properties of cathode rays, and then write it into a paper and publish it, so that he can get ahead of Leonard and get the opportunity to win this award.

The award-winning achievements of the seventh winner Michelson and the eighth winner Lippmann were also born long ago.

The ninth winners, Marconi and Braun, were awarded for their contributions to the cathode ray tube and radio, which also happened to be Zhang Xingjiu's research areas. They completed these two achievements in 1897 and 1898.

Zhang Xingjiu can keep a close eye on their movements, formulate his own experimental plan, seize the opportunity and achieve his goal just one or two months ahead of them, and then he can get his third Nobel Prize.

The tenth winner, Van der Waals, also completed his formula.

The 11th winner happened to be an acquaintance of Zhang Xingjiu, Wien, who invented the Wien formula, so he could also grab this achievement.

Zhang Xingjiu won four of the previous eleven awards. If the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences still doesn't award him the prize, that would be unreasonable, right?

　There will be more later
　　
　
(End of this chapter)