The problem is the idea that the worth of a scientist or their work can somehow be established by a title, prize, medal. Much less that the Nobel Committee memb

The problem is the idea that the worth of a scientist or their work can somehow be established by a title, prize, medal. Much less that the Nobel Committee members don't conform to the circa-2010s leftist/progressivist political bias. People are very quick to delegate the responsibility to decide whether things are worth our while to somebody, anybody, lest we actually have to do the evaluating ourselves. Has it won an Oscar? What is the most popular SQL database? Which University has the highest ranking? Has his work been published in a respectable journal? All of these questions are a sub-optimal proxy for "is it the best?" or even a more modest "is it any good?" But with the reverence to the Nobel Prize, it's maybe even something else. It's the human longing for an ultimate authority, for some priest who would tell us what is good, and what is evil. In that case, I'm glad the author feels frustrated.