Michael Valdez Moses on Subjective Value and the Nobel Prize in Literature

Three Nobel Prizes have already
been announced this week, and Thomson Reuters, which has
“accurately forecast 35 winners since 2002,” failed to predict any
of the new laureates. The well-respected firm “mines scientific
research citations to identify the most influential researchers in
the fields of chemistry, physics, medicine, and economics.” Next
week’s announcement by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences of the
prize in Economics offers a chance for Thomson Reuters to save
face. But even so prominent a handicapper, with a significant
financial stake in the accuracy of its predictions, dares not
predict the winners of the prizes in literature and peace, which
have been awarded since 1901. Why?

Oddly enough, writes Michael Valdez Moses, for an institution so
addicted to rigid ideas and authoritarian personalities, the
judgment behind the awarding of the Nobel Prize in literature is an
exercise in the subjective theory of value.

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