Curated playlist

National Medal of Science laureates

John Archibald WheelerJohn Archibald Wheeler spent decades calling a dying star a "gravitationally completely collapsed object."
Charles David KeelingA chemist who nearly became a concert pianist created the Keeling Curve, a graph of rising carbon dioxide.
Richard FeynmanRichard Feynman's last words, spoken after a long coma, were "This dying is boring." The remark suited an American theoretical physicist who never lost his taste for blunt, irreverent honesty. He was a man who treated authority, ceremony…
Yang Chen-NingYang Chen-Ning, the theoretical physicist also known as C.N. Yang and Franklin Yang, died in Beijing on the 18th of October 2025. He was 103 years old. The day after his death was announced, people gathered at Tsinghua University and…
Allen NewellAllen Newell helped build what is widely regarded as the first true AI program, the Logic Theorist.
Milton FriedmanMilton Friedman argued the Federal Reserve let the money supply shrink by one-third between 1929 and 1933.
Paul SamuelsonPaul Samuelson said he was born as an economist at age sixteen. It happened in a 1932 Chicago lecture on Malthus.
Edward TellerEdward Teller stood and watched the Trinity test while nearly everyone else lay face-down.
Eugene WignerPhysicist Eugene Wigner found that neutron radiation could make the graphite in a reactor swell.
George LowAfter three astronauts died in the Apollo 1 fire, George Low took charge of fixing the spacecraft.
James WatsonJames Watson put his name to a scientific paper that fills just two pages of the journal Nature, pages 737 and 738 of volume 171. Watson, an American molecular biologist, wrote it with Francis Crick in 1953. Its subject was DNA, and its…
Claude ShannonClaude Shannon built a mechanical mouse that learned its way through a maze. He named the 1950 machine Theseus.
Herbert A. SimonHerbert Simon argued that people don't pick the best option, they settle for good enough. He called it satisficing.
B. F. SkinnerB. F. Skinner proposed steering missiles with pigeons. The birds pecked at a screen showing the target.
Gary BeckerEconomist Gary Becker argued that criminals are not irrational. He said they weigh the risks and rewards of a crime.
Igor SikorskyA mosquito in a fuel tank changed Igor Sikorsky's career. The crash-landing made him want an aircraft that could fly on.
Anthony FauciAnthony Fauci, pronounced FOW-chee, once summed up his working life in a single sentence. In a 2020 interview with The Guardian, he said, "My career and my identity has really been defined by HIV." That is a striking claim from a man whose…
Donald KnuthDonald Knuth, an American computer scientist born in 1938, pays $2.56 to anyone who finds a mistake in one of his books. The number is deliberate. As he explains it, 256 pennies make one hexadecimal dollar. A smaller reward of $0.32 goes…
Kurt GödelIn 1931, Kurt Gödel proved that any sufficiently powerful math system contains true statements it cannot prove.
Wernher von BraunWernher von Braun's V-2 rocket cost more lives to build than it took as a weapon.
John McCarthy (computer scientist)John McCarthy coined the term "artificial intelligence" in the summer of 1956. He also created the language Lisp.
Roger RevelleIn 1957, Roger Revelle warned that humans were running a huge experiment on Earth.
Linus PaulingLinus Pauling left high school without a diploma. He later won two unshared Nobel Prizes, a first in history.
Peter DebyeA unit of measurement, a lunar crater and a minor planet all carry Peter Debye's name.
Theodosius DobzhanskyTheodosius Dobzhansky went from collecting butterflies in Kiev to writing a landmark book on evolution.
John G. TrumpJohn G. Trump died in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the 21st of February 1985, six days before a White House ceremony in his honor. His son John Jr. accepted the National Medal of Science on his behalf. President Ronald Reagan had awarded…
Subrahmanyan ChandrasekharSubrahmanyan Chandrasekhar sailed from India to England in 1930, and on that first sea voyage he worked out a number that would outlive him. The number was 1.44. It is the greatest mass, counted in suns, that a white dwarf star can have. A…