The Breakdown
Shakespeare’s catalog of poems and plays is unrivaled, and with his tight plots, beautiful wordplay, and ribald puns, there’s really something for everyone in the Bard’s work. Pasteur was less entertaining, but it’s tough to find any fault with his work. After all, he told us that microorganisms cause disease, which led to all sorts of health breakthroughs in addition to the rabies and anthrax vaccines Pasteur himself created. Without pasteurization, our milk and beer wouldn’t be as durable or as delicious. Shakespeare’s work is more quotable, while Pasteur’s is more drinkable. Who’s the bigger genius?
[poll=58]
[See the whole bracket here.]
Comments (9)
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delicious beer… yummmmm…. we have a winner!
posted by jimmy b on 4-1-2009 at 2:51 pm
Come on Shakespeare! We need somebody to represent the arts!
posted by Dave on 4-1-2009 at 3:13 pm
C’mon, Sweet William! Pasteurize Louis!
posted by loripop on 4-1-2009 at 3:35 pm
Shakespeare!
I’d be hard pressed to vote for anyone over him…
posted by Nerak on 4-1-2009 at 3:49 pm
Go Billy! Go Billy! GO, GO, GO, Billy!!
recaptcha: the chief
posted by TC on 4-1-2009 at 3:50 pm
It’s not fair. Shakespeare should get a lot of votes & Pasteur almost none. We need a genius of the arts. Who need beer & milk when you’ve got Hamlet???
posted by Karl on 4-1-2009 at 9:35 pm
If Pasteur never lived, we might die sooner but Shakespeare is one to die for. If Shakespeare never lived, Pasteur would probably have devoted his talents to writing plays.
posted by John Doherty on 4-2-2009 at 12:24 am
Billy shakes! Woooo!
Zach
posted by Zach on 4-2-2009 at 8:18 am
My votes with Shakespeare, but I do note that both share a “combination of opportunity, culture, and preference,” to use Scott Page’s terminology in his book, The Difference, to shine.
As Emerson, notes in Representative Man, at a time of illiteracy and widespread theater going (along with the death of his son Hamnet as an inspiration for at least one play, Hamlet), Shakespeare found a niche for his genius for understanding and expressing the human condition.
Of little consequence is the fact that like many playwrights of his time he borrowed many of his plots from plays and dramas familiar to his audiences; they were prepared to receive it, no less than he was prepared to be the world’s universal genius.
This is not to take anything away from Pasteur, who similarly suffered the loss of children from typhus, whose French heritage brought him to solving the problem of contamination in wine and later to pasteurization of milk and sterilization of medical instruments, among other things. He had gifted insight, to apply the methods of wine purification to these other areas. And yes his academic and scientific credits were impressive, but a greater genius than Shakespeare, who invented the modern man, along with valuable psychological insights only appreciated centuries later? I think not.
posted by Jeff-for-progress on 6-3-2009 at 3:53 pm