(My answer in Quora)
There are six Nobel Prizes awarded. Those given out for Physics, Chemistry, Medicine/Physiology are extremely relevant. They are offered to acknowledge groundbreaking empirically verified achievement in each of the big three hard sciences.
Such titans as Albert Einstein, Neils Bohr, Louis de Broglie and Murray Gell-Mann have won for physics. Svante Arrhenius, Ernest Rutherford, Linus Pauling and Marie Curie were awarded the prize for Chemistry (she also won for Physics). Alexander Fleming, Thomas Hunt Morgan, Watson/Crick and Konrad Lorenz were acknowledged for their achievements in the Medical Sciences.
These prize reflect the pinnacle of success in the sciences and have further highlighted the contribution to all of humanity that science has been responsible for through the invention of the transistor, our growing understanding of molecular genetics and our ability to innovate with polymerization (to name just three of many highlights).
Now this is not say that those who won each year were the most deserving. It can also be argued that several key figures in the respective discipline who should have won were regrettably omitted. Douglas Prasher in Medicine/Biology is such a figure, Gábor A. Somorjai in Chemistry is another with Gilbert Lewis - he of Lewis Dot structure fame - being a third (Lewis was nominated 41 times).
The fact that the award is not given Posthumously ensured that Rosalind Franklin who played a pivotal role in the elucidation of the double helix structure for DNA did not win the Prize when it was awarded in 1962 (she died in 1958). Although some believe that there was politics at play here that further shed a negative light on her omission.
Nobel Prizes are awarded as well for Economics, Literature and Peace - the soft Nobels. These three look to be extremely tinged with political and social bias and have lost some of their relevancy with time.
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