Nobel Prize and discussions

Indians are talkative in nature, according to “Argumentative Indians,” authored by Indian Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen. Those in the U.N. say, “The most challenging work for the chair of an international conference is to stop Indians from speaking and make Japanese speak.” Even if the gap of English fluency is considered, Indians talk too much and Japanese too little.

There seems to be a strong relation between talkativeness and arguments. In France and Germany, people are quiet in a bus. If someone talks, elderly people sitting in the bus glare at the person. But it is loud in a bus in the U.K. In France and Germany, teachers complain that students have fewer questions than their counterparts in English speaking countries. Far fewer questions in Korea. There are no questions and answers in classes, and there are only one-way lectures. Koreans tolerate simple questions about lectures, but they find it as a challenge to their authority if someone points out a logical flaw in their lecture.

Nature, an international weekly journal of science, recently ran an article titled, “Why South Korea is the world’s biggest investor in research.” It would be more suitable to change the title, “Why can’t South Korea win the Nobel Prize despite being the world’s biggest investor in research?” Korea makes the largest investment in research compared to GDP. It surpassed Japan and the U.S., and its investment is double the size of that of the EU and China. Nonetheless, it has no Nobel laureate in science. One of the reasons suggested is that there is no robust discussions in the lab and such culture can be hardly fixed because it started from education at schools.

It appears that the world knows that Korea badly wants the Nobel Prize in literature or science. In January, the New Yorker magazine said that Koreans want the Nobel Prize in literature while not reading books. The journal Nature seemed to point out that a country of no robust discussions wants the Nobel Prize in science. We need to look at where we stand, instead of just looking at a higher place.

송평인기자 pisong@donga.com