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I will note that (Soviet vs. US/European success) in (Olympic sports vs. Nobel/Fields medals) strongly supports this argument. Prodigy manufacture has been trie

• littlestymaar 7y ago
  The soviet success is a good example, but I don't think it supports your point: the soviets where very successful at training athletes to become gold medalists but they were also really successful at training mathematicians and physicists, even after losing almost all the educated class during the revolution and the following war (a majority a them were “White” Russians who fled the country). You could argue that they were more successful at training athletes than scientists, because they have more gold medals than Nobel prize. But I don't think it really makes sense to compare those figures: soviets were doping there athletes a lot, and many of these gold medals comes from what I would call “mere performance sport” (like Athletics or Weightlifting), and they were competing with the West on the prestige given by gold medal, while the Nobel prize weren't a goal in itself. They were the first to reach space thought ;). Also, you shouldn't dismiss the existence of an American “prodigy manufacture”: the American school and university system was extremely successful during the second third of the century and that's where most the American scientific success comes from, and the American sport system has also been excellent for a while.
  • solveit 7y ago
    The Soviets dominated the Olympics, but they produced 25 Nobel Prizes to America's 375. I might agree with you were the numbers less extreme. Re: American prodigy manufacture, you have a good point and I should think about this more.