Say “celebrity” and most people think of movie stars or pop singers. But at New Scientist we believe that scientists can be celebrities too. In an attempt to redress the balance, we have done our own study, bringing C. P. Snow’s “two cultures” head to head in a test of star status.
We thought a fair measure of a celeb’s standing would come from the number of hits they got on Googie, the internet search engine. Our method was to key in a single monitor – “Elvis” say – on the assumption that real stars don’t need two names. This approach has some obvious drawbacks. First, it eliminates any Smiths, Browns or Bloggses, but that can’t be helped. Besides, we suspect the burden of an ordinary name is enought to prevent anyone attaining true greatness. Secondly, not all the hits for “Madonna”, say, will refer to the great lady herself. But when you’re talking millions, a few runs for the other blessed virgin don’t count for much.
These reservations aside, the results are intriguing. With only a little dubious Googling, the scientits come out on top overall, and have the highest single entry (see Graphic). With an astounding 15 million plus hits, “Ford” is on a par with “Jesus” and a third of the way to achieving “God” – like ratings. To give the artists their due, their team probably has greater depth, although the nature of artistic celebrity seems a lot more fickle.
There are lessons to be learned. Our advice for any scientist aspiring to stardom is, first die. Also,if you can’t spawn one of the world’s largest car companies,…
