Is South Korea Really Behind in Research Because It Has Not Won a Nobel Prize?

This year, another Japanese scientist won a Nobel Prize.

It was welcome news for Japan, but whenever this subject comes up, Japan’s online right-wing circles somehow waste no time turning their attention to South Korea.

“Once again, South Korea won zero Nobel Prizes in the natural sciences this year.”

There is even a term, “Nobel disease,” used to mock South Korea’s obsession with the prize.

There are also stories of South Korean universities preparing empty pedestals in advance, ready to hold busts when their researchers eventually win Nobel Prizes.

It is a rather mean-spirited joke, but there is probably some truth to the idea that South Korean society is acutely conscious of the Nobel Prize.

While watching several YouTube videos about South Korea’s relationship with the Nobel Prize, I came across an analysis that took a slightly different angle.

South Koreans themselves were examining, without resorting to emotional arguments, why their country has yet to produce a Nobel laureate in the natural sciences.

I found it quite interesting.

Outstanding People Alone Do Not Produce Research Breakthroughs

The video identified three major problems.

The first was research investment that emphasizes short-term economic returns. Applied research that can lead to commercial products tends to take priority over basic research, whose benefits are harder to see.

The second was an education system that values the ability to arrive efficiently at the correct answer. The ability to score highly on an exam is not necessarily the same as the ability to tackle a question whose answer no one knows.

The third was the pressure on researchers to deliver short-term results. In an environment where results are expected within a few years, it is difficult to spend decades pursuing a subject that may never produce any results at all.

Many Nobel-worthy discoveries began as research whose value was not even understood at the outset.

In other words, gathering talented people and investing vast amounts of research funding are not enough. What is also needed is a system willing to tolerate, over long periods, research that may never produce results.

Why Not Aim for an Ig Nobel Prize First?

Hearing this made me wonder about something.

Why not have South Korea aim for an Ig Nobel Prize first?

The Ig Nobel Prize is awarded for research that first makes people laugh and then makes them think. Japanese researchers are known for winning it regularly.

Much of the research appears, at first glance, to have no practical use whatsoever. But that is precisely what makes it interesting.

“What could possibly be gained by studying that?”

Perhaps an environment in which researchers can answer, “I study it because it is interesting,” is exactly what basic research needs.

If researchers pursue only subjects known from the outset to have practical applications, unexpected discoveries are unlikely to emerge.

What matters is a culture that does not prejudge the usefulness of research.

A society where researchers can earnestly devote themselves to seemingly ridiculous questions may, surprisingly, be a healthy one for science.

Do Countries Need to Aim for Nobel Prizes at All?

What stayed with me most was not the video itself, but a comment from one of its viewers.

“Do all countries really need to aim for Nobel Prizes in the first place?”

I think this gets to the heart of the matter.

Discovering a new principle through basic research and using that principle to create an excellent product require different abilities.

South Korea has built global competitiveness in fields such as semiconductors and displays. That achievement deserves recognition regardless of how many Nobel Prizes the country has won.

One country may excel at basic research while another excels at practical applications and commercialization. If technology advances through each country making use of its strengths, what exactly is the problem?

The Nobel Prize was never designed as a comprehensive measure of a nation’s technological capabilities.

Competing over the number of laureates and contributing to society through science and technology are not necessarily the same thing.

Something Goes Wrong the Moment a Nobel Prize Becomes the Goal

What made this video interesting was that it neither praised nor disparaged South Korea. Instead, it prompted viewers to think about the research system itself.

Japan, too, has repeatedly faced concerns over the allocation of research funding and the demand for short-term results. This is by no means someone else’s problem.

Scientific progress requires talented people and funding. More than that, however, it requires the latitude to tolerate research whose practical value is not yet clear.

Do people conduct research in order to win a Nobel Prize? Or does a Nobel Prize follow as a result of pursuing a question they found interesting?

If we get that order wrong, even research policy could be pushed in a misguided direction.

Rather than preparing a pedestal for a future Nobel laureate, setting aside funding for research whose usefulness no one can yet explain may be a far more effective shortcut to a Nobel Prize.