Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
When I heard about the prize
my first reaction was to wonder whether I was worthy.
Then the weight of it slowly began to sink in.
What stands out most clearly is who responded first.
I got calls from overseas ahead of anybody in Japan,
and became very aware of the weight of the prize internationally.
Yesterday's ceremony strongly rammed
home the responsibility of it.
My impression is that, unlike other prizes,
this will become part of my identity.
I think that all those involved in research and applications
see a "breakthrough" as the process of opening a door
and going through it.
They believe that if they go through
they might find something interesting inside.
With a door, though, there's always another,
and another behind that.
Sometimes you keep going and going and there's no end.
I think that at that stage,
so far as a "breakthrough" is concerned,
when you think "This is original," it no longer is.
In my case, too, I can't boast any great originality.
I simply believed theoretically and experimentally
that organic material should conduct electricity,
so I just tried it.
The satisfaction when I made my measurements
- that's the ultimate.
You think, "So it does work."
Then you see another door.
You think, "What if this works?"
and you want to go through that door.
Seen from the outside,
what happened prompted people to use the word "originality,"
but, I wasn't conscious of it, and if I was,
it would no longer have been creativity.
I guess that sounds a bit like a response to a Zen riddle,
but that's how I feel.
Our path in life is to "Know our sufficiency; "
that is, at a certain stage,
to achieve a certain sense of satisfaction.
This is a fundamental part of our lives,
and I believe we have to make an effort to protect it.
Consequently, to put it in terms of the spirit of the Kyoto Prize,
the main thing is to be satisfied
within a framework in which humans exist as humans,
not in the sense of being personally satisfied,
but so that society is satisfied.