Nobel Conference

Nobel Conference at Gustavus Adolphus College, Saint Peter.

Gustavus Adolphus College is a church-related, residential liberal arts college firmly rooted in its Swedish and Lutheran heritage.

The College offers students of high aspiration and promise a liberal arts education of recognized excellence provided by faculty who embody the highest standards of teaching and scholarship. The Gustavus curriculum is designed to bring students to mastery of a particular area of study within a general framework that is both interdisciplinary and international in perspective.

The College strives to balance educational tradition with innovation and to foster the development of values as an integral part of intellectual growth. It seeks to promote the open exchange of ideas and the independent pursuit of learning.

The College aspires to be a community of persons from diverse backgrounds who respect and affirm the dignity of all people. It is a community where a mature understanding of the Christian faith and lives of service are nurtured and students are encouraged to work toward a just and peaceful world.

The purpose of a Gustavus education is to help its students attain their full potential as persons, to develop in them a capacity and passion for lifelong learning, and to prepare them for fulfilling lives of leadership and service in society.

The Nobel Conference is an academic conference held annually at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minnesota. Founded in 1963, the conference links a general audience with the world's foremost scholars and researchers in conversations centered on contemporary issues related to the natural and social sciences. It is the first ongoing academic conference in the United States to have the official authorization of the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden.

History

Gustavus Adolphus College was founded by Swedish immigrants in 1862 and throughout its history, has continued to honor its Swedish heritage. As the College prepared to build a new science hall in the early 1960s, College officials asked the Nobel Foundation for permission to name the building the Alfred Nobel Hall of Science as a memorial to the great Swedish inventor and philanthropist. Permission was granted, and the facility's dedication ceremony in 1963 included 26 Nobel laureates and officials from the Nobel Foundation.

Following the 1963 Nobel Prize ceremonies in Stockholm, College representatives met with Nobel Foundation officials, asking them to endorse an annual science conference at the College and to allow use of the Nobel name to establish credibility and high standards. At the urging of several prominent Nobel laureates, the foundation granted the request and the first conference was held at the College in January 1965.

For four and a half decades, world-class research scientists and scholars have come together to discuss leading topics in science with audiences of thousands.

The Nobel Conference brings students, educators and members of the general public together with the leading thinkers of our time, to explore revolutionary, transformative and pressing scientific questions and the ethical issues that arise with them.

Mission

Throughout its history, Gustavus Adolphus College has honored its Swedish heritage and its commitment to excellence in education. When the College began planning for a new hall of science in the early 1960s, College officials asked the Nobel Foundation for permission to name the building the Alfred Nobel Hall of Science as a memorial to the great Swedish inventor and philanthropist whose bequest endowed the world-renowned prizes. The Nobel Foundation granted Gustavus permission to use the name, and when the building was dedicated on May 4, 1963, the ceremony counted 26 Nobel laureates, as well as officials from the Nobel Foundation among its distinguished guests. It was the third largest gathering of laureates to date—and the largest outside Sweden.

Ralph Bunche delivered the address at the Nobel Memorial Banquet. Bunche was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950 for brokering a cease fire between Israelis and Arabs in the 1948 war that followed the creation of Israel. He was the first African American to be awarded the Peace Prize. Chemistry Laureate Linus Pauling (1954) stayed on after the dedication ceremonies to deliver lectures to the Gustavus community about his book No More War.

The following December, representatives of the College attended the Nobel Prize ceremonies in Stockholm. Following the conclusion of the ceremonies, those representatives met one evening with officials from The Nobel Foundation at the country home of the Countess Estelle Bernadotte, the widow of Count Folke Bernadotte, outside Stockholm. The Gustavus contingent, which included President Edgar Carlson, Vice President Reynold Anderson, and Dr. Philip Hench, a Nobel laureate in medicine, made an unusual request of The Nobel Foundation: to authorize an annual science conference at the College, and to allow the conference to be named The Nobel Conference—a mark of its credibility, and of the high standards it would uphold.

The Gustavus representatives laid out their twofold vision for the conference:

bring cutting-edge science issues to the attention of an audience of students and interested adults; and to engage the panelists and the audience in a discussion of the moral and societal impact of these issues.

At the urging of several prominent Nobel laureates, The Nobel Foundation granted the College’s request, and the first conference—“Genetics and the Future of Man”—was held in January 1965.

After more than five decades, the Nobel Conference continues to be guided by that original vision. The list of conference is a documentary record of some of the central scientific and social scientific questions of those five decades, as well some of the pressing ethical challenges to which those questions have given rise. In serving that twofold vision, the Nobel Conference endeavors to realize the spirit of Alfred Nobel’s original bequest, which honored the efforts of those who “have conferred the greatest benefit to humanity” in the areas of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, and peace.

More about the Conference history can be found in these reflections from Rev. Richard Q. Elvee, former chaplain of the College and Nobel Conference director from 1981 to 1999.

Upcoming- Mental Health

Topic: (In)Equality and Young People

Prioritizing the mental health concerns of young people has become essential amid times of global pandemic, racism, sexism, ableism, social unrest, climate change, and political upheaval. These social inequities limit our ability to promote resilience in the mental health of adolescents and young adults, especially those from marginalized communities. Young people often experience little control over their wellbeing, are affected by the decisions of parents, schools and society, and in these technology-driven times are vulnerable to the negative side effects of social media and information overload. In considering how to eradicate inequities and promote mental health, technology becomes central in how it both aids and hinders our modern existence, in the U.S. and around the world.

Nobel Conference 58 will address mental health disparities and their effects on youth, with a particular emphasis on the significance of identity, trauma and technology.

Confirmed 2022 Speakers
  • Meryl Alper, Associate Professor of Communication Studies, Northeastern University
  • Manuela Barreto, Professor of Social and Organizational Psychology, University of Exeter
  • Daniel Eisenberg, Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management, UCLA
  • Joseph Gone, Professor of Anthropology and of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard
  • Priscilla Lui, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Southern Methodist University
  • G. Nic Rider, Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Transgender Health Program, Institute for Sexual and Gender Health, and Associate Director for Research, National Center for Gender Spectrum Health, University of Minnesota Medical School
  • Brendesha Tynes, Associate Professor of Education and Psychology, USC

Current

The 2021 Nobel Conference is titled "Data REvolution" and took place October 5–6, 2021 in Saint Peter, Minnesota at Gustavus Adolphus College.

How is big data changing our lives, and what challenges and opportunities does this transformation present? In less than a generation, we’ve witnessed nearly every piece of personal, scientific, and societal data come to be stored digitally. Stored information is both an intellectual and an economic commodity; it is used by businesses, governments, academics, and entrepreneurs. The velocity with which it accumulates and the techniques for leveraging it grow at a pace that is remarkable and often intimidating. But this revolution also promises hope, in areas as diverse as public health, drug development, child welfare, and climate change.

Lecturers included:

  • Talithia Williams, PhD: Professor of Mathematics, Harvey Mudd College
  • Francesca Dominici, PhD Clarence James Gamble Professor of Biostatistics, Population and Data Science; Co-Director, the Data Science Initiative, Harvard University
  • Michael Osterholm, PhD A Regents Professor and McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Public Health; Director, Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota
  • Cynthia Rudin, PhD Professor of Computer Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Statistical Science; Director, Prediction Analysis Lab, Duke University
  • Pilar Ossorio, JD, PhD Professor of Law and Bioethics, University of Wisconsin
  • Rhema Vaithianathan, PhD Professor of Health Economics; Director, Centre for Social Data Analytics, Auckland University of Technology
  • Wendy Chun, PhD Canada 150 Research Chair; Leader, the Digital Democracies Institute, Simon Fraser University

2020- Cancer in the Age of Biotechnology

2019- Climate Changed: Facing Our Future

Lectures Included:

2018- Living Soil: "A Universe Underfoot"

Lectures Included

2017- Reproductive Technology- How Far Do We Go"

Lectures included:

2016 - In Search of Economic Balance

Lecturers included:

2015 - Addiction: Exploring the Science and Experience of an Equal Opportunity Condition

Lecturers included:

  • Owen Flanagan, Ph.D, James B. Duke Professor and Faculty Fellow in Cognitive Neuroscience at Duke University
  • Eric R. Kandel, MD, Neuropsychiatrist and 2000 Nobel laureate in physiology and medicine
  • Carl Hart, Ph.D, Neuroscientist
  • Denise Kandel, Ph.D, Medical sociologist
  • Marc David Lewis, Ph.D, Developmental neuroscientist
  • John A. List, Ph.D, Economist
  • Sheigla B. Murphy, Ph.D, Director of the Center for Substance Abuse Studies at the Institute for Scientific Analysis

2014 - Where does Science Go from Here?

Lecturers included:

2013 - The Universe at its Limits

Lecturers included:

Other past Nobel Conferences include:

  • 2012 - Our Global Ocean
  • 2011 - The Brain and Being Human
  • 2010 - Making Food Good

2000s
  • 2009 - H2O Uncertain Resource
  • 2008 - Who Were the First Humans?
  • 2007 - Heating Up: The Energy Debate
  • 2006 - Medicine: Prescription for Tomorrow
  • 2005 - The Legacy of Einstein
  • 2004 - The Science of Aging
  • 2003 - The Story of Life
  • 2002 - The Nature of Nurture
  • 2001 - What is still to be discovered?
  • 2000 - Globalization 2000: Economic Prospects and Challenges

(2000) Lecturers included:

1990s
  • 1999 - Genetics in the New Millennium
  • 1998 - Virus: The Human Connection
  • 1997 - Unveiling the Solar System: 30 Years of Exploration
  • 1996 - Apes at the End of an Age: Primate Language and Behavior in the '90s
  • 1995 - The New Shape of Matter: Materials Challenge Science
  • 1994 - Unlocking the Brain: Progress in Neuroscience
  • 1993 - Nature Out of Balance: The New Ecology
  • 1992 - Immunity: The Battle Within
  • 1991 - The Evolving Cosmos
  • 1990 - Chaos: The New Science

1980s
  • 1989 - The End of Science?
  • 1988 - The Restless Earth
  • 1987 - Evolution of Sex
  • 1986 - The Legacy of Keynes
  • 1985 - The Impact of Science on Society
  • 1984 - How We Know: The Inner Frontiers of Cognitive Science
  • 1983 - Manipulating Life
  • 1982 - Darwin's Legacy
  • 1981 - The Place of Mind in Nature
  • 1980 - The Aesthetic Dimension of Science

1970s
  • 1979 - The Future of the Market Economy
  • 1978 - Global Resources: Perspectives and Alternatives
  • 1977 - The Nature of Life
  • 1976 - The Nature of the Physical Universe
  • 1975 - The Future of Science
  • 1974 - The Quest for Peace
  • 1973 - The Destiny of Women
  • 1972 - The End of Life
  • 1971 - Shaping the Future
  • 1970 - Creativity

1960s
  • 1969 - Communication
  • 1968 - The Uniqueness of Man
  • 1967 - The Human Mind
  • 1966 - The Control of the Environment
  • 1965 - Genetics and the Future of Man
  • Nobel Conference official website
  • Archival finding aid for the collection Nobel Conference. Nobel Conference Collection, 1965-Ongoing. GACA Collection 92. Gustavus Adolphus College Archives, St. Peter, Minnesota.
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