On the 19th the Chosun Ilbo published, in its Weekly Biz section, an interview headlined that a Nobel-level discovery by AI is entirely possible and that people should be AI's masters, not its slaves. The same day its Good Morning Membership column ran a piece titled Will the day come when AI wins a Nobel Prize? We could not open the text of either article, so the interviewee's identity and detailed arguments are unconfirmed; this report relies on the questions raised in the headlines and on verifiable public background.

The headlines point to two core claims: an optimistic view that AI-led Nobel-caliber science is entirely feasible, and a call for humans to keep control of how AI is used rather than be subordinated to it. This matches a widening sense that AI in research has moved up to proposing hypotheses and designing experiments.

AI was already on the Nobel stage

AI has in fact already reached the Nobel stage. The 2024 Physics Prize went to John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton, who laid foundations of machine learning, and the Chemistry Prize to Google DeepMind's Demis Hassabis and John Jumper, who developed the protein-structure AI AlphaFold, and to David Baker for computational protein design. Korean media called it a symbol of an era in which AI drives scientific revolutions.

Those laureates, however, were creators of AI or AI tools, not cases of AI itself being the discoverer. That distinction is the crux of whether AI could win a Nobel. The prizes go to people and institutions, and this search found no rule or move to recognize AI as a laureate.

The Nobel committee's caution

At the Nobel Prize Dialogue Seoul 2026, held at COEX on September 20, cautious voices prevailed. SBS Biz reported that Hanna Stjerne, secretary-general of the Nobel Foundation, said AI already plays a significant role in prize-winning work but the principle of honoring work that benefits humanity will not change. Eva Olsson, a Nobel physics committee member, said the committee's detective-style tracing of who did the work first will continue in the AI era.

Others stressed the human role. David MacMillan of Princeton said creative use of AI is the key skill, and Craig Mello of UMass Chan said AI currently serves more to spark scientists' curiosity while processing vast data. Speakers also noted debate over whether the 2024 physics prize was truly physics; the committee judged it eligible because the work applied statistical physics.

Optimism and limits therefore coexist. The chance that AI contributes to Nobel-caliber discoveries has grown, but who counts as the discoverer, who bears responsibility and verification, and how prize criteria apply remain open questions. The advice to be AI's master, not its slave, can be read as urging humans to keep asking the questions and verifying the results. The specific arguments of the two Chosun pieces need to be added once their text can be checked.