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Ilya Prigogine

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Scientist

The Resume

    (January 25, 1917-May 28, 2003)
    Born in Moscow, Russia
    Physical chemist
    Known for his work on dissipative structures and non-equilibrium thermodynamics
    Wrote or co-wrote 'Introduction to Thermodynamics of Irreversible Processes' (1955), 'From Being to Becoming' (1980), and 'Order Out of Chaos' (1984)
    Recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1977)
    Became a citizen of Belgium (1949)
    Last name pronounced PRIG-uh-jean

Why he might be annoying:

    One of his childhood hobbies was memorizing train tables.
    He originally planned to be a concert pianist, but gave it up for chemistry.
    He claimed that before his work, physics had 'no direction of time, no distinction between past and future,' which ignores the work of Ludwig Boltzmann, who had shown statistically how processes that are time-reversible at a molecular level could produce irreversible results on a macroscopic scale (which had been described as 'time's arrow' by astronomer <29097>Arthur Eddington He speculated that the universe would become self-aware. (Although he seems to have stopped short of speculating if the universe would then become like SkyNet and start killing off the inferior human beings.)

Why he might not be annoying:

    His work on dissipative structures led to pioneering research on self-organizing systems.
    He has been called 'the godfather of chaos theory.'
    His research had applications in fields outside of chemistry, such as traffic scheduling and urban planning.
    He said, 'I am very much against the priesthood of science, against isolating scientists, putting them in ivory towers. Why shouldn't science be part of the cultural process, when today the future of the world depends very much on science, technology, and new inventions?'

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    For 2024, as of last weekly ranking, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2023, Out of 5 Votes: 40.0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 4 Votes: 0% Annoying