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Thursday, October 08, 2009

Father of former Brewer farmhand wins Nobel Prize?

Checks rosters for a Chandrasekhar or a Ruži?ka. Nope.

Two Americans and an Israeli won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work on how the DNA code is translated into life, findings that have been used to fight infectious disease.

Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, 57, who heads the Structural Studies Division at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England; Thomas A. Steitz , 69, Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University in Connecticut, and Ada E. Yonath, a professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, will share the 10 million-krona ($1.4 million) award, the Nobel Assembly said at a press conference in Stockholm today.

...Steitz, also an American, was born in 1940 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He has a doctorate in molecular biology and biochemistry from Harvard University and teaches molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale. His son Jon Steitz is a former pitcher for the Milwaukee Brewers baseball team.

Jon Steitz

Thanks to Rich Rifkin.

Repoz Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:55 AM | 51 comment(s) Login to Bookmark
  Tags: brewers, international

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   1. Rich Rifkin Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:25 AM (#3344690)
Assuming genetic inheritance and an educationally nurturing environment explains most of IQ, I would not be surprised if Jon Steitz had the highest IQ in pro baseball history -- or at least among the Brew Crew. Not only did his father win the Nobel Prize, but his mother, Prof. Joan Steitz of Yale, is a world renowned molecular biologist and might herself win a Nobel Prize someday.

She's already won the Gairdner Foundation International Award; the U.S. Steel Foundation Award in Molecular Biology; the National Medal of Science, National Science Foundation; the Christopher Columbus Discovery Award in Biomedical Research; the UNESCO-L'Oréal Award for Women in Science; and the Lewis S. Rosenstiel Award for Distinguished Work in Basic Medical Science.
   2. The Keith Law Blog Blah Blah (battlekow) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:45 AM (#3344701)
I would not be surprised if Jon Steitz had the highest IQ in pro baseball history -- or at least among the Brew Crew.

Clearly you never watched Alex Sanchez play.
   3. Textbook Editor Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:21 AM (#3344720)
High cotton indeed.

As someone who edits physics textbooks (and has worked on chemistry textbooks), I always get a wee bit excited for this week, as I retain faint hopes some professor I've corresponded with wins a Nobel. It's never happened.
   4. Howie Menckel Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:24 AM (#3344722)
Does Nobel have finalists, too, or is it "all in" in terms of winning - or nothing?
   5. Juan V Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:25 AM (#3344724)
Does Nobel have finalists, too, or is it "all in" in terms of winning - or nothing?


I think it's all in, at least as long as the public is concerned.
   6. Zipperholes Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:43 AM (#3344729)
Darn, at first I thought it was Venkatraman Ramakrishnan's son.
   7. Gonfalon Bubble Posted: October 08, 2009 at 05:45 AM (#3344748)
Assuming genetic inheritance and an educationally nurturing environment explains most of IQ, I would not be surprised if Jon Steitz had the highest IQ in pro baseball history -- or at least among the Brew Crew. Not only did his father win the Nobel Prize, but his mother, Prof. Joan Steitz of Yale, is a world renowned molecular biologist and might herself win a Nobel Prize someday.

Half of Jon Steitz was 90% mental.
   8. Lassus Posted: October 08, 2009 at 07:07 AM (#3344761)
I wonder what Gaelan thinks about this.
   9. Lassus Posted: October 08, 2009 at 07:08 AM (#3344762)
double post
   10. snapper (history's 42nd greatest monster) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 11:45 AM (#3344783)
Man, if I had just won a Noble Prize I be pissed at being calle the "father of [a] former Brewer farm hand".

How about "Nobel prize winner Steitz has son who played in minors."
   11. VoodooR Posted: October 08, 2009 at 12:12 PM (#3344795)
That's a pretty lackluster baseball career for the junior Steitz...
   12. Bob Dernier Cri Posted: October 08, 2009 at 01:13 PM (#3344815)
Meanwhile Herta Müller has won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her books are not in print in English AFAICT. No word on any offspring in organized baseball.
   13. Tom Nawrocki Posted: October 08, 2009 at 01:41 PM (#3344835)
Somewhere this morning, Billy Jo Robidoux is calling up his father and saying, "And what have you ever done, Dad?"
   14. DL from MN Posted: October 08, 2009 at 01:46 PM (#3344843)
Is he smarter than Craig Breslow?
   15. Zach Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:01 PM (#3344858)
As someone who edits physics textbooks (and has worked on chemistry textbooks), I always get a wee bit excited for this week, as I retain faint hopes some professor I've corresponded with wins a Nobel. It's never happened.

I was in grad school the year Jan Hall won it. It was pretty neat to see somebody that happy. He talked about
Beethoven and the shipborne chronometer and holding a newborn baby and told us to pursue our dreams and smell the flowers and remembered President Kennedy and thanked the shop guys three times. It was the greatest explanation of the femtosecond laser comb that I've ever heard.
   16. Van Lingle Mungo Jerry Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:22 PM (#3344871)
It was the greatest explanation of the femtosecond laser comb that I've ever heard.


How many have you heard?
   17. Liver of blaspheming 'zop Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:25 PM (#3344875)
Assuming genetic inheritance and an educationally nurturing environment explains most of IQ, I would not be surprised if Jon Steitz had the highest IQ in pro baseball history -- or at least among the Brew Crew. Not only did his father win the Nobel Prize, but his mother, Prof. Joan Steitz of Yale, is a world renowned molecular biologist and might herself win a Nobel Prize someday.

Not all Nobel Prize winners are super-intelligent. I worked fairly closely with a winner of the Crafoord Prize when I was in graduate school, which is the de facto Nobel for sciences that aren't covered by the Nobel.

He was smart enough, I guess. But his real gift was politics. He could raise money almost at will. He was a ferocious self-promoter. And he had an amazing ability to recognize up-and-coming-talent and convince them to work with him. He co-authored 100's of papers with more talented scientists...but if you get 40% of the credit for a paper and churn out 4 times as many papers as anyone else, all of a sudden you dominate your field. But he didn't really have a deep understanding of the science, he wasn't such a great mentor, and he was an awful, awful teacher.

There were plenty of well-recognized scientists that I worked with that were brilliant. But a guy that wins the really "publicity" oriented prize may just have a gift for.... publicity.
   18. Sean Forman Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:32 PM (#3344888)
I'm guessing that is the first doctorate from Ohio University to win a Nobel. Pretty cool for them.
   19. Bob Dernier Cri Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:35 PM (#3344890)
I was assuming I'd never met a Nobel Prize winner, but I remembered some stray associations. I have heard Seamus Heaney and Wole Soyinka give lectures. I saw Jimmy Carter wave to a crowd on Election Eve in 1976. For a year or two, office mailbox was right next to Toni Morrison's, but I never met her. And I met John Nash many times, though he was never lucid in those years. I guess I had always assumed, given Nash's case, that a brilliant result or discovery would bring acclaim in the sciences no matter what your networking skills, which in his case were nil. The Nobel in Literature, naturally, like the Peace Prize, is highly politicized.

There should be a Nobel Prize in Baseball. Earl Weaver should win the first one.
   20. Zach Posted: October 08, 2009 at 02:40 PM (#3344897)
How many have you heard?

I have several friends who work with combs, so quite a few. But that's the only one where the guy lost his train of thought and burbled happily for ten minutes.

The physics Nobelists I've met are all pretty great guys. But the area of physics I work in was a sideline for a long time, so maybe the politicians sought out the sexier areas.
   21. esseff Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:21 PM (#3344943)
Is he smarter than Craig Breslow?


Steitz and Breslow were teammates at Yale, along with Matt McCarthy, who writes about both of them in "Odd Man Out."

McCarthy worked in Prof. Steitz's lab at Yale.

EDIT: And McCarthy says Jon Steitz had a perfect SAT II score.
   22. Designated Sitter (GGC) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:25 PM (#3344947)
I wonder what Gaelan thinks about this.


??
   23. Don't want the truth; just wanna see some dingers Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:30 PM (#3344952)
Who is the codebreaking spy who played earlier this century--Max Berg?
   24. esseff Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:32 PM (#3344956)
Moe Berg? If so, not this century.
   25. Don't want the truth; just wanna see some dingers Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:32 PM (#3344957)
It was Moe Berg
   26. esseff Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:39 PM (#3344959)
It was Moe Berg


Note, in that link to all things catcher, the seventh item from the top. Ya got your chest protector, your mask, your shinguards, your catcher bio, your Salinger . . .
   27. Designated Sitter (GGC) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:54 PM (#3344968)
Weirdsville:


Newsblog: Father of former Brewer farmhand wins Nobel Prize?
(26 - 11:39am, Oct 08)
Last: ess eff
   28. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 08, 2009 at 03:59 PM (#3344973)
I don't get it, GGC.
   29. Designated Sitter (GGC) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:03 PM (#3344978)
The coding is screwed up or something. The number of posts is in the middle of the time and there are two closed parens,
   30. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:34 PM (#3345011)
What I see is on the sidebar and in your post is:
(26 - 11:39am, Oct 08) 

or
left paren, # of posts, hyphen, time, comma, date, right paren
which is what I always see.
   31. esseff Posted: October 08, 2009 at 04:47 PM (#3345019)
I also see the screwed-up version under hot topics. Time first and then # of posts, unlike everything else showing in hot topics.

Under the Law of Ess Eff, I no doubt did something to cause this, and if I knew what it was, I'd fix it.
   32. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 08, 2009 at 05:03 PM (#3345045)
do you see that with other topics? is it a browser issue (i'm in ie right now)?
   33. The Keith Law Blog Blah Blah (battlekow) Posted: October 08, 2009 at 05:09 PM (#3345058)
Yeah, the format in the Hot Topics for this thread has been screwed up for me since it was posted last night; I'm running OS 10.6.1 and Firefox 3.5.3.
   34. Gonfalon Bubble Posted: October 08, 2009 at 05:20 PM (#3345071)
Who is the codebreaking spy who played earlier this century--Max Berg?

It was Moe Berg

Dave Berg successfully cracked the meaning behind the dots and dashes on every "Spy vs. Spy."
   35. Rich Rifkin Posted: October 08, 2009 at 11:39 PM (#3345462)
Peter Berg, son of Larry Berg, no relation to Moe Berg or St. Petersburg, directed the recent ESPN movie about the trade of Wayne Gretzky, as well as the high school football movie Friday Night Lights, but did not direct the movie about the ice berg.
   36. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 09, 2009 at 04:55 PM (#3346423)
I can see why.
I like the Nobel Prize in baseball idea, btw - and imagine it would look something like the requilary.
   37. Rich Rifkin Posted: October 09, 2009 at 06:33 PM (#3346543)
I liked Barack Obama's reaction to the text message he got when the Swede's told him he had won the Nobel Peace Prize:
WTF?
At least it was based on his having accomplished nothing so far and not on his having invented an autobiography, as told in Salon.com:
(Rigoberta) Menchú's account of her family's situation is also distorted. She had no brother who starved to death, at least none that her own family could remember. The ladinos were not a ruling caste in her town or district, in which there were no large estates as she claims. The Menchús, moreover, were not poor in the way Rigoberta describes them. Vicente Menchú had title to 2,753 hectares of land. The 22-year land dispute described by Rigoberta, which is the central event in the book leading to the rebellion, in fact concerned a tiny 151-hectare parcel of land. Moreover, his "heroic struggle against the landowners who wanted to take our land" was in fact not a dispute with representatives of a European-descended conquistador class but with his own Mayan relatives, the Tum family, headed by his wife's uncle.

Vicente Menchú did not organize a peasant resistance called Committee for Campesino Unity. He was a conservative, insofar as he was political at all. His consuming passion was not any social concern, but the family feud with his in-laws, who were small landowning peasants like himself.
It is bizarre how prestigious the science awards for the Nobel Prize are, while the Peace Prize has been terribly demeaned by the idiots in Scandanavia who pick a winner out of a hat every year.

If I had any say in who should have won it, I think a good case could be made at this point for giving the prize to Col. Sean MacFarland, the American officer in Iraq who convinced Sheikh Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, a regional Sunni chieftan, to make peace with the U.S. and to help fight Al-Qaeda in Iraq, in exchange for the Americans protecting the Sunnis from Shiite terrorists. That move by MacFarland led to the Sunni Awakening, which ultimately created the semi-peace which exists in Iraq today. Had Al-Qaeda not successfully murdered Abu Risha, he would be a great candidate to share the award with MacFarland.
   38. Shooty: Applying to be Fearless Leader Posted: October 09, 2009 at 06:49 PM (#3346563)
I liked Barack Obama's reaction to the text message he got when the Swede's told him he had won the Nobel Peace Prize:

WTF?

I think it's kinda fun Obama was as surprised as anyone by the award. I spoke with my mom this morning and, though we're both big Obama supporters, we both think it's kinda (to put it mildy) premature. I'm taking it as one last #### YOU to W. from the Swedes.
   39. Ron Johnson Posted: October 09, 2009 at 06:52 PM (#3346568)
Shooty, you've just picked up your own personal #### YOU from the Norwegians.

Though apparently there are plenty of Norwegians who are going WTF? too.
   40. Shooty: Applying to be Fearless Leader Posted: October 09, 2009 at 06:55 PM (#3346573)
Shooty, you've just picked up your own personal #### YOU from the Norwegians.

What'd I do to the Norwegians? Is it because I'm a quarter Swede? That's racist!
   41. Best Regards, Larry M. Posted: October 09, 2009 at 06:55 PM (#3346574)
It's better than Al Gore, who certainly deserved to be awarded for using his political influence to help mankind, but I don't think promoting awareness of Global Warming has or will do much to promote peace.
   42. robinred Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:02 PM (#3346581)
What'd I do to the Norwegians


They're pissed because you only hook your mom up with Canadians.
   43. Shooty: Applying to be Fearless Leader Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:06 PM (#3346590)
They're pissed because you only hook your mom up with Canadians.

Mom doesn't like the smell of herring. I keep telling them, taking a ####### bath you dirty walrus people!, but do they listen? Nope. It's all just yumpin yoompin yompin. Bunch of jerks.
   44. RJ in TO Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:10 PM (#3346597)
Mom doesn't like the smell of herring.

No she doesn't. But the smell of maple syrup and seal blood really gets her engine going.
   45. Shooty: Applying to be Fearless Leader Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:23 PM (#3346616)
No she doesn't. But the smell of maple syrup and seal blood really gets her engine going.

Mom's a mystery.
   46. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:25 PM (#3346619)
Whereas I'm a quarter Norwegian, Shooty. It's on ############.
   47. RJ in TO Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:31 PM (#3346627)
Whereas I'm a quarter Norwegian, Shooty. It's on ############.


I'd be careful if I were you. Shooty is well aware of your weakness - a line drive to the nether regions.
   48. Andere Richtingen Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:32 PM (#3346629)
I don't think promoting awareness of Global Warming has or will do much to promote peace.

Seriously? Rapid climate change ----> Agricultural disasters -----> Socioeconomic unrest -----> War.

Gore getting the NPP of course can be reasonably questioned, but I think something like having an impact on global warming is extremely relevant. Norman Borlaug would be another example.
   49. Shooty: Applying to be Fearless Leader Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:35 PM (#3346631)
Whereas I'm a quarter Norwegian, Shooty. It's on ############.

I'll just wait for some German bruiser to bang on you for a while and then I'll go play Jenga or something.



Too soon?
   50. Der Komminsk-sar Posted: October 09, 2009 at 07:37 PM (#3346632)
It's never too soon. For Jenga!

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