Greatest Scientists Ever: Elimination Game

Thread Games
241

At present, only James Hutton has 3 net votes.
(But Tesla and Meitner are also under threat; see below.)

I’ll adopt all these suggestions, but exactly how “temporary” should the Keeps be? As of now, Lise Meitner is being kept alive by Gyrate’s most recent post on 23 November in Round 8. Nicolai Tesla is being kept alive by What Exit’s most recent post on 22 November in Round 7.

It’s not a pressing matter. I think this present Round will be the last round in December; and I’ll discard ALL old votes when the Game resumes in January.

… But speaking of Tesla: Why the enormous love for this guy? (I’m not speaking of Dopers here, but the Internet in general.) He is called “the man who invented the twentieth century”; is frequently placed on Top Ten lists of geniuses or scientists; and is often compared, favorably, to Einstein.(*) He was certainly eccentric and probably greater than the more-famous Edison — but so what? Edison was one of the very first eliminations in our game.

I had a conversation with another ex-pat here in the jungle, who insisted Tesla was a greater genius than Einstein. On questioning I learned that he thought Tesla had found an unlimited power source that Big Oil suppressed, and that Einstein was disqualified by his religion! (“There must be something wrong with them; why else would people have hated them for thousands of years?” That was the last time I spoke with that fellow ex-pat.)

242

I seem to have run through the Big List I sent to septimus, and now need to think of more evictees

Evict:
Hilleman
Leakey
Vesalius
Salk
Huygens
Bernard
Agassiz
Crick

Keep:
Meitner

As far as the general rules go, I would be in favour of the ruleset proposed by MfM, with a temporary Keep length of one week unless the player explicitly specifies otherwise

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Evict:

Hilleman
Leakey
Vesalius
Salk
Huygens
Bernard
Agassiz
Meitner

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With less than three hours until vote deadline, here are the scientists with two or more active votes:
Agassiz, Louis : 3
Crick, Francis : 3
Hilleman, Maurice : 3
Hutton, James : 3
Leakey, Louis : 4-1 = 2.99

Huygens, Christiaan : 2
Salk, Jonas : 2
Vesalius, Andreas : 2
Bernard, Claude : 3-1 = 1.99
Tesla, Nicolai : 3-1 = 1.99
Meitner, Lise : 4-2 = 1.99

Leeuwenhoek, Antonie van : 1-2 = -1
Franklin, Benjamin : 1-4 = -3
If no votes are changed, the first five names above will be eliminated.

245

Elimination Round #13 is over. As just mentioned, Agassiz, Crick, Hilleman, Hutton, and Leakey have been Evicted.

We will pause now, and resume the Game early in January. Our original target of 36 Finalists was arbitrary; instead we ended with 44 Finalists. I’m open to suggestions on how to proceed with further Evictions in January … and to suggestions on how to improve participation! Post suggestions in the thread, or PM to me.

Official Scientists List: (Forty-four Finalists)

Archimedes - math, physics
Bernard, Claude - physiology
Boas, Franz - anthropology
Bohr, Niels - atomic physics
Boyle, Robert - chemistry, physics
Copernicus, Nicolas - astronomy
Curie, Marie - radioactivity
Darwin, Charles - biology
Einstein, Albert - physics
Eratosthenes - math, astronomy
Euclid - math
Euler, Leonhard - math
Faraday, Michael - electromagnetism, etc.
Fermat, Pierre de - math, optics
Fermi, Enrico - atomic physics
Feynman, Richard - physics
Franklin, Benjamin - physics, etc.
Franklin, Rosalind - chemistry, X-ray crystallography
Galileo - physics, astronomy, etc.
Gauss, Karl - math, astronomy
Heisenberg, Werner - quantum theory
Hubble, Edwin - astronomy
Huygens, Christiaan - optics, physics
Kepler, Johannes - astronomy, math
Lavoisier, Antoine - chemistry
Leeuwenhoek, Antonie van - microbiology, microscopy
Leibnitz, Gottfried - math, physics, etc.
Linnaeus, Carolus - botany, taxonomy
Maxwell, James Clerk - physics
Meitner, Lise - atomic physics
Mendel, Gregor - genetics
Mendeleev, Dmitri - chemistry
Neumann, John von - computer science, etc.
Newton, Sir Isaac - math, physics
Pasteur, Louis - chemistry, biology
Pauling, Linus - chemistry
Planck, Max - quantum physics
Rutherford, Ernest - nuclear physics, atomic theory, radioactivity.
Salk, Jonas - medicine, vaccination
Tesla, Nicolai - physics, invention
Turing, Alan - computer science, etc.
Vesalius, Andreas - founder of anatomical sciences
Volta, Alessandro - chemistry, physics
Watson, James - Dna
Ninety-two Nominated Scientists have been Eliminated:
[del]Agassiz, Louis - biology, geology[/del] 12/06
[del]Al-Biruni, Abu Rayhan Muhammad - natural philosophy[/del] 11/29
[del]Al-Khwarizmi, Muhammad ibn Musa - math, astronomy[/del] 11/27
[del]Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham - physics, etc.[/del] 11/15
[del]Anning, Mary - paleontology[/del] 11/15
[del]Aristotle - philosophy, geology, biology, etc.[/del] 11/17
[del]Arrow, Kenneth - economics[/del] 11/11
[del]Babbage, Charles - computer science[/del] 11/20
[del]Bacon, Francis - philosophy[/del] 11/17
[del]Bardeen, John - physics, invention[/del] 11/27
[del]Berzelius, Jacob - chemistry[/del] 11/29
[del]Boltzmann, Ludwig - thermodynamics[/del] 11/20
[del]Borlaug, Norman - agronomics[/del] 12/1
[del]Brahmagupta - math, astronomy[/del] 11/20
[del]Braun, Wernher von - rocket science[/del] 11/13
[del]Bruno, Giordano - philosophy[/del] 11/15
[del]Cannon, Annie Jump - astronomy[/del] 11/20
[del]Crick, Francis - Dna[/del] 12/06
[del]Dalton, John - chemistry[/del] 12/4
[del]Davy, Sir Humphrey - chemistry[/del] 11/22
[del]Dirac, Paul - physics[/del] 11/24
[del]Doppler, Christian - physics[/del] 11/24
[del]Edison, Thomas Alva - invention[/del] 11/09
[del]Fleming, Sir Alexander - medicine, biology[/del] 11/20
[del]Freud, Sigmund - psychology[/del] 11/09
[del]Friedman, Milton - economics[/del] 11/09
[del]Galen, of Pergamon - biology, medicine[/del] 12/1
[del]Ge Hong - philosophy, alchemy[/del] 11/09
[del]Gell-Mann, Murray - physics[/del] 11/27
[del]Goddard, Robert - rocket science[/del] 11/13
[del]Godel, Kurt - math[/del] 11/17
[del]Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von - natural philosophy[/del] 11/13
[del]Goodall, Jane - primatology[/del] 11/15
[del]Gutenberg, Johannes - invention[/del] 11/11
[del]Haber, Fritz - chemistry; invention (fertilizer, gas warfare)[/del] 11/15
[del]Halley, Edmond - astronomy, etc.[/del] 11/13
[del]Hamilton, William - astronomy, optics, math[/del] 11/15
[del]Harvey, William - anatomy, blood[/del] 11/22
[del]Hawking, Stephen - cosmology[/del] 11/24
[del]Hilleman, Maurice - biology, vaccination; saved more lives[/del] 12/06
[del]Hipparchus, of Nicaea - astronomy, etc.[/del] 11/22
[del]Hippocrates, of Cos - medicine[/del] 11/20
[del]Hopper, Grace - computer science[/del] 11/15
[del]Hutton, James - geologist[/del] 12/06
[del]Ibn al-Nafis - anatomy, blood[/del] 11/15
[del]Jenner, Edward - vaccination[/del] 12/1
[del]Jung, Carl - psychology[/del] 11/11
[del]Keynes, John Maynard - economics[/del] 11/13
[del]Lamarr, Hedy - invention[/del] 11/11
[del]Leakey, Louis - anthropology[/del] 12/06
[del]Leavitt, Henrietta Swan - astronomy[/del] 11/22
[del]Leonardo da Vinci - anatomy, invention, etc.[/del] 11/15
[del]Liebig, Justus von - organic chemistry; a great practical scientist.[/del] 11/17
[del]Lister, Joseph - antiseptics[/del] 11/17
[del]Lovelace, Ada Byron Countess of - computer science[/del] 11/22
[del]Lyell, Charles - geology[/del] 11/20
[del]Mach, Ernst - physics, cosmology[/del] 12/1
[del]Marconi, Guglielmo - radio transmission[/del] 11/15
[del]Marsh, Othneil = paleontology[/del] 11/17
[del]McClintock, Barbara - genetics[/del] 11/24
[del]Mead, Margaret - anthropology[/del] 11/20
[del]Michelson, Albert - astronomy; speed of light[/del] 12/1
[del]Morley, Edward - astronomy, chemistry, optics, and physics.[/del] 11/17
[del]Mullis, Kary - biology[/del] 11/17
[del]Nisibis, St. Jacob of - theology, founded early school[/del] 11/09
[del]Noether, Emmy - math[/del] 11/27
[del]Ockham, William of - philosophy[/del] 11/11
[del]Oppenheimer, Robert - atomic physics[/del] 11/20
[del]Patterson. Clair - geochemistry[/del] 11/15
[del]Pauli, Wolfgang - quantum physics[/del] 12/4
[del]Poincare, Henri - math[/del] 11/29
[del]Ptolemy - astronomy[/del] 12/4
[del]Pythagoras - math[/del] 11/17
[del]Ricardo, David - economics[/del] 11/11
[del]Rubin, Vera - astronomy[/del] 11/15
[del]Russell, Bertrand - math[/del] 11/17
[del]Sagan, Carl - astronomy[/del] 11/09
[del]Sakharov, Andrei - nuclear physics[/del] 11/13
[del]Samuelson, Paul - economics[/del] 11/11
[del]Schrodinger, Erwin - wave mechanics[/del] 12/1
[del]Semmelweis, Ignaz - antiseptics[/del] 11/17
[del]Shannon, Claude - computer science[/del] 11/20
[del]Smith, Adam - economics[/del] 11/11
[del]Smith, William - geology[/del] 11/24
[del]Thales, of Miletus - math[/del] 11/20
[del]Thorne, Kip - physics[/del] 11/20
[del]Tyson, Neil deGrasse - astrophysics, science popularizer[/del] 11/09
[del]Ventner, Craig - genetics[/del] 11/15
[del]Virchow, Rudolf - medicine, cell doctrine, etc.[/del] 11/13
[del]Wegener, Alfred - meteorology, continental drift[/del] 11/29
[del]Wigner, Eugene - physics, symmetry[/del] 11/17
[del]Zhang Heng - astronomy, mechanics[/del] 11/22

246

I suggest that when you start the thread again in January, you start a new thread and link back to this one. That might encourage players who don’t feel like coming into the middle of a thread game.

247

So Hilleman made it into the top 50. Yay!

Sounds like a good idea to start a new thread - maybe we can solidify the rules in the OP.

We have a list of the top 49. Bonus question: which of the following should be added back into it to make an even 50?

Dalton, John - chemistry
Pauli, Wolfgang - quantum physics
Ptolemy - astronomy

Previous joking aside, they are all great scientists. I vote for John Dalton, the formulator of modern atomic theory. That’s foundational to physics, chemistry, and biochemistry.

248

Let **septimus **have Aristotle as a Christmas present :smiley:

249

The Finalist List of 44 seems pretty reasonable, but I wonder what six names I’d add to make it an even Fifty. Here are ten scientists already eliminated to whom I’d look for the extra six:
Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham - physics, etc.
Aristotle - philosophy, geology, biology, etc.
Bacon, Francis - philosophy
Boltzmann, Ludwig - thermodynamics
Dalton, John - chemistry
Dirac, Paul - physics
Hipparchus, of Nicaea - astronomy, etc.
Leibnitz, Gottfried - math, physics, etc.
Liebig, Justus von - organic chemistry
Lyell, Charles - geology

250

(Leibnitz is already in the list of 44.)

251

:smack: Well that’s good — I need to prune that list of 10 down to 6 anyway, to make a round-numbered List of 50.

But I can NOT prune it any further. We need to EVICT three more from the List of 44 to make room for these Moderator’s choices! :smiley:

252

As I’m sure many of you are, I am disappointed by the eliminations of some of the great scientists. Let me get it out of my system with one Big Diatribe. Once I go on record with this tantrum, I’ll be able to resist the temptation to usurp Moderator’s Power and insert these eliminated scientists back onto the List. :stuck_out_tongue:

The name of the Diatribe is
“If you haven’t eliminated XXXX yet, then you shouldn’t have eliminated YYYY.”
Benjamin Franklin was a great genius and polymath, but had only modest scientific accomplishments.
Leonardo da Vinci was an ever greater genius and as an inventor vastly surpassed Franklin.

Gauss was one of the greatest math geniuses, but contributed little to physics beyond math tools.
Henri Poincare was also a great genius and had creative ideas that influenced chaos theory, special and general relativity, and cosmology.

Copernicus had a little math skill and was an influential astronomer.
Hipparchus of Nicaea was a greatly under-rated mathematical physicist and perhaps the most influential astronomer ever.

Eratosthenes was nicknamed ‘Beta’ – he wasn’t the best at anything.
Alhazen has been called the ‘First Scientist’ and wrote the most influential physics text of the Middle Ages.

Mendeleev had one good idea.
John Dalton was a polymath who made several important contributions.

James Watson made one important discovery.
Von Liebig made numerous foundational contributions, theoretical and practical, to organic chemistry.

Fermi was just one of several early atomic physicists.
Paul Dirac was one of the very greatest of modern theoreticians.

Meitner was another among several early atomic physicists.
Ludwig Boltzmann was the great theorist who mentored her and filled her with awe.

Jonas Salk developed a vaccine.
Aristotle and Francis Bacon were among the most influential scientific philosophers ever.

Tesla was just one of several early developers of alternating current systems.
Charles Lyell and James Hutton were the great geologists whose work inspired Charles Darwin.

There! I’ve got it out of my system! :stuck_out_tongue:

253

I approves such ranting. In the new year, the new thread will set it aside.

Babe Ruth was a great baseball player. But he wasn’t a scientist.

Wiki: Da Vinci “…made substantial discoveries in anatomy, civil engineering, geology, optics, and hydrodynamics, but he did not publish his findings and they had no direct influence on later science.”
Da Vinci was an inventor and artist. Doesn’t remotely belong in top 50 scientists. Franklin is probably due for the drop list though.

I’m wondering whether Gauss’ statistical discoveries qualify him though. Statistics is foundational to modern science.

Copernicus gets credit for being a “Turning point” scientist. Doesn’t belong in top 10.

No idea why Tesla is still standing.

I think there’s a case for pairing Maurice Hilleman with Crick (which, as it happens, is what we did). Crick was a bright guy who was at the right place and right time. Hilleman was a tremendously talented scientist who made no breakthrough discoveries on his own. As I said earlier, I think a representative of normal science (in Kuhn’s terms) belongs on the list of 100.

So I’ll add them to sep’s list. I think Crick/Hilleman belong on the list of “Maybe 50”. Not sure they belong in the actual 50.

Choose 6 of 11:

Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham - physics, etc.
Aristotle - philosophy, geology, biology, etc.
Bacon, Francis - philosophy
Boltzmann, Ludwig - thermodynamics
Crick, Francis - DNA
Dalton, John - chemistry
Dirac, Paul - physics
Hilleman, Maurice - biology, vaccination; saved more lives
Hipparchus, of Nicaea - astronomy, etc.
Liebig, Justus von - organic chemistry
Lyell, Charles - geology

Upvote Aristotle. Chronos is correct that his work did massive damage to science, because later medieval types treated him as an authority rather than a thinker. But he was the first methodical thinker/writer on natural history. There’s no real analogue in other cultures untouched by the Greece. If the organization of knowledge is prerequisite to science, and if such organization requires institution, genius, and intellectual ambition, then Aristotle may have pushed science forward by thousands of years. He may have been an historical anomaly. Or not. It’s hard to know because he was the first. (Analogous to Gutenberg in some ways.)

Aristotle is the only guy with a plausible claim on the top 10 and a plausible ban from the top 100. (Because screw Freud. :smiley: ).

Downvote Bacon: He did great work, but he wasn’t a practicing scientist. Also, how much influence did he have? I’d say that if you want to include a philosopher from the past 600 years, choose Karl Popper. His notion of falsification is applied broadly.

Upvote Dalton
Upvote Lyell
Upvote Boltzmann, Ludwig Ludwig Boltzmann - Wikipedia
Upvote Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham (965-1040), because his writings anticipate the scientific method Ibn al-Haytham - Wikipedia

That leaves one. Flip a coin for Crick/Hilleman.

254

Well Franklin is hard to argue for I suppose but some of his inventions also required theory and experimentation and had major impact on humans in a wide range of fields.

[ul]
[li]Bifocals[/li][li]Electricity[/li][li]An Account of the Kite Experiment[/li][li]How Franklin Made His Kite[/li][li]For Whom the Bells Toll[/li][li]Assault on Batteries[/li][li]Lightning Rod[/li][li]Franklin Stove[/li][li]Mapping the Gulf Stream This one is noteworthy. [/li][li]Swim Fins[/li][li]Glass Armonica[/li][li]Flexible Urinary Catheter This one is of especial note. [/li][li]Odometer[/li][li]Long Arm[/li][/ul]
On the battery: In his experiments, Franklin coined many of the terms we still used today. Battery, charge, condensor, conductor, plus, minus, positively, negatively & armature.

255

Now Tesla, do you really think he was only Alternating Current? Tesla scientific work is simply amazing and his lack of business smarts was agonizing. His wireless radio experiments were far more innovative then his AC advances. In his wireless experiments he demonstrated remote control of motorized devices. Also on his list is the X-Ray and the Tesla Coil of course.