Hong Kong Shaw Award Matures

HONG KONG – Rainer Weiss has never won a prize for his work in physics. That changed in 2016, when he and two other scientists received the Shaw Award for their groundbreaking achievements in the field of gravitational waves.

Honor proved to be a harbinger: a year later, Weiss was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for the same research.

Although the Hong Kong-based Shaw Award is not as well-known as its Swedish cousin, its importance has steadily grown in the global scientific community. In the 15 years since the Shaw Prize Foundation began nominating recipients, she has gained remarkable experience in recognizing Nobel-winning scientists. Of the 79 Shaw winners, 12, or 15% of the total, were later awarded the Nobel Prize.

The Shaw Award, sometimes called the "Nobel Prize for Asia", includes three annual awards: astronomy, life sciences and medicine and mathematics. Each includes a monetary reward of $ 1.2 million, compared to NZ $ 9 million ($ 987,000) for the Nobel Prize. This year's winners – from Argentina, France and the United States – were named in May and will be honored at a glitzy banquet in Hong Kong on Wednesday.

Although there is some overlap in the categories between Asian and Scandinavian awards, such as the Shaw Award in Life Sciences and Medicine and the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, Hong's organization Kong intentionally avoided reflecting the Nobels. In creating the award, the foundation drew attention to topics it believes will "grow rapidly in the 21st century," said Raymond Chan, president of the Shaw Prize Foundation.

Run Run Shaw, the Hong Kong media mogul, left, and his wife Mona Fong, when they arrive at the Shaw Award Ceremony in Hong Kong in 2011.

© Imaginechina / AP Images

Weiss and others who were among the first winners claimed to have earned their stature thanks to the outstanding reputation of the selection committees, composed of highly respected physicians, academics and researchers from Asia, Europe and Europe. North America.

"I knew a lot of people who had won the award over the years," said Weiss, professor emeritus of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, adding that the Shaw Award has touched on all the important aspects of astrophysics. Being included in this group of beneficiaries, he said, was a "huge" distinction.

Kip S. Thorne of the California Institute of Technology shared the Shaw and Nobel Prizes with Weiss.

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Kip S. Thorne of the California Institute of Technology, who shared the Shaw and Nobel Prizes with Weiss, echoes this sentiment. Since receiving the first prize in 2004, "his story has been very prominent," he said. "To receive him was an honor."

Chan recognizes the academic strength of the committees for the success of the award. With the high standards they established, he said, "The Shaw Award has been awarded to the most illustrious people, honoring their work and having changed the world".

The award was created by Run Run Shaw, the Chinese-born media mogul who ran the legendary Shaw Brothers film studio, which produced some of the greatest Chinese cinema movies at its peak in the 1960s and 1970s and helped launch TVB's dominant TV station. Shaw, who died in 2014 at the age of 106, was also an eminent philanthropist. Today, he is known for both his charitable work and his business acumen.

In the last three years, two other businessmen have created two other awards in Hong Kong.

He Che-woo, president of K. Wah Group

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He Che-woo, president of K. Wah Group, a conglomerate in the fields of real estate, entertainment and hospitality, created the Lui Che Woo Award to reward individuals and organizations in three areas: sustainability, improved wellbeing and positive energy. Among previous recipients, former US President Jimmy Carter received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. The recipients of the Lui Che Woo Award received $ 20 million from Hong Kong ($ 2.55 million). dollars). The awards ceremony will be held in early October.

The Yidan Award, launched by Charles Chen Yidan, co-founder of Tencent Holdings, awards two prizes a year for education. Each has a $ 30 million grant from Hong Kong. This year's winners, announced in mid-September, will be honored at a ceremony in December.

The philanthropy of affluent businessmen from Asia has sparked renewed interest this month, when Jack Ma Yu, founder and executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding, said that 39, he would give up his title next year to devote himself to education. And when Hong Kong magnate Li Ka-shing stepped down as president and CEO of his two flagship conglomerates, CK Hutchison Holdings and CK Asset Holdings, in May, he clearly voiced support for the Li Ka Foundation. -shing. in 1980, the focus was on education and health care.

Michael W. Young won the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, four years after receiving the Shaw Award.

© WireImage / Getty Images

Ruth A. Shapiro, executive director of the Center for Asian Philanthropy and Society, a Hong Kong-based research and advisory organization and co-author of the book "Pragmatic Philanthropy," notes that one of the differences between philanthropy in Asia and elsewhere is the desire to guanxi – or stronger relationships – with business partners, friends, and governments, as well as seeking support for charitable donations. "It gives status not only to the donor but to the region," she said.

"The ego is an important factor in philanthropy, but it is not the case for Asia, we all seek status and philanthropy is a way to achieve this", said Shapiro. "Will Bill Gates really be remembered for an operating system that will probably cease to exist in the not too distant future?" she says. "The ego, in this sense, contributes to a constructive result."

The Shaw Prize Foundation is in transition after the death of Mona Fong, the wife of Run Run Shaw, who has created the award since its inception. But daily operations continued uninterrupted. "Fong's presence has been largely lacking on a personal level, but his foresight to put in place strong management ensures the effective and ongoing operation of all aspects of the foundation's work," Chan said.

Chan said the foundation continues to develop programs beyond the annual Shaw Awards Ceremony. To raise public awareness of the award, the foundation holds public conferences and forums with winners in Hong Kong during the week of the awards ceremony and will expand these activities to other cities around the world.

These efforts will help ensure the continuation of the Shaw Award over the coming decades, as Run Run Shaw wanted. And the winners express their confidence in his legacy.

Michael W. Young of Rockefeller University in New York, who shared the Shaw Award with two others in 2013 for their discovery of the molecular mechanisms underlying circadian rhythms and was awarded a Nobel Prize last year based on those who have been named in the past, and it is a story that accumulates. "The prize is, he says," highly significant and highly prestigious ".