this post was submitted on 07 Oct 2025
422 points (99.5% liked)

Not The Onion

18426 readers
2289 users here now

Welcome

We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!

The Rules

Posts must be:

  1. Links to news stories from...
  2. ...credible sources, with...
  3. ...their original headlines, that...
  4. ...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”

Please also avoid duplicates.

Comments and post content must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.

And that’s basically it!

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Fred Ramsdell was among those honoured with a 2025 Nobel Prize in Medicine but might not know because he is somewhere in Idaho and uncontactable

top 11 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] half_fiction@lemmy.dbzer0.com 103 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

The Nobel committee also hit a roadblock trying to reach Brunkow – both researchers are based on the US West Coast, which is nine hours behind Stockholm – but eventually got ahold of her...

In 2020 the Nobel committee had similar difficulties in contacting the winners of the prize for economics. When Bob Wilson’s phone rang in Stanford in the middle of the night, he unplugged it so the committee had to call his wife instead.

When the committee couldn’t reach his fellow winner, Paul Milgrom, either, Wilson had to go and wake him up.

This is annoying to me. Is there seriously no better way than to call older people in the middle of the night and then act surprised when they are not immediately available?

[–] murvel@feddit.nu 26 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

They want to call the recipient in connection to the announcement so that the recipient hears it from the committee first hand. And since the announcement is made during the day (figure that), the call is made no matter the recipients time zone.

[–] half_fiction@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah, I understand why it's currently happening like that, but it's still annoying to call at 2am and be like, "they were so hard to get on the phone!" Seems to be a recurring problem so might be worth it to have a contingency plan for winners within certain time zones, even if you just quietly inform them a few hours earlier that they should make sure they're available at that time.

[–] Nollij@sopuli.xyz 11 points 2 weeks ago

Presumably they all are informed that they've been nominated. They could also ask them beforehand what their preference is if they win.

2am calls are why people leave their profession.

[–] phdepressed@sh.itjust.works 21 points 2 weeks ago

"Its how we've always done it."

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 weeks ago

Also, there is no time limit here, does it really matter if they find out a few hours or days later?

Press just wants a quote like from John Polanyi, " I hope this doesn't turn me into a blithering idiot".

[–] LuckingFurker@lemmy.blahaj.zone 52 points 2 weeks ago

Love that for him

[–] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 31 points 2 weeks ago

I read "uncontactable" as "uncontrollable" at first and I like my version much better.

Something about a Nobel prize winning immunologist uncontrollably roaming the wilds of Idaho really tickles my funny bone 😁

[–] Acid_Burn@lemmy.dbzer0.com 15 points 2 weeks ago

As someone who lives in Idaho, I can relate to this guy. It's easy to wander the wilderness and not want to come back.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 14 points 2 weeks ago

Not the first time this has happened. In 1956 they gave the Nobel in Medicine to Werner Forssman for discovery of angioplasty. The problem is Forssman did the first angioplasty on himself, and he got fired from the hospital for doing so. The Nobel committee had to track him down because his career in medicine had ended after being fired.

[–] SW42@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago

Giga Chad move