As Germany and England prepare to meet in the World Cup tournament, The Independent newspaper [in London] totes up their comparative history in other competitions:
Three Miss Worlds and one (rugby) World Cup
We’ve all heard the song. But there’s more to life than football and fighting. So how do England and Germany measure up at the Nobels? The Oscars? Crufts? Kevin Rawlinson keeps score…
Newton and Einstein’s respective countries of birth have contributed their fair share to the sum of human knowledge. To date, Britain is ahead – by the measure of Nobel laureates – with 117 to Germany’s 103.
Einstein received his award for services to theoretical physics. Harold Pinter, who died in 2008, recorded his lecture address while in hospital after winning the award for literature.
England has 17 Ig Nobel awards (for “improbable research”) to Germany’s two. English recipients were honoured for calculating “the optimal way to dunk a biscuit” and for working out how to make a teapot spout that doesn’t drip.