Quote:
Originally Posted by acidzebra
Newton was a total dick. No, really. Additionally, he dabbled in alchemy and lord knows what else, as was the fashion at the time. He was extremely unconventional. Einstein was not a dick (I think, I haven't read a biography but wasn't there something about his marriage or wife?), but at least as unconventional. Hawking, I don't know. Did he have much choice in the matter? You could also say that almost everything about him is unconventional. I know lots of Tysons (?Dyson? given the list?), I do not know which one you are referring to.
They greatly advanced human knowledge, but they were not "regular joes on the street". It takes a certain mindset to venture off into the unknown, and neatly obeying all the rules does not fit.
All personal opinion of course.
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Absolutely, personal opinion. I just disagree with many of your personal opinions. I would also take issue with calling Sir Issac Newton a "dick." He loved cats ... I love cats ... that's enough for me. Any man who is thoughtful enough to invent the cat door is a good guy in my book.
And .... just because someone is a "dick" ... that doesn't make them unconventional. It just makes them a dick. Being a dick doesn't mean you are an original thinker, or creative, or much of anything else ... other than a dick.
Lots of heroes are regular joes on the street. In fact, most people who do heroic things are regular joes. But ... there are different types of heroes. There are the personal heroes ... great men of science, or people who are renowned for what they do in the arts, or in business ... and people will generally disagree on what makes a person a personal hero because it's personal. (Duh ... right??)
For example ... Paul Newman is one of my personal heroes. Not because I think he was and is a great looking guy, and not because I think he was and is a great actor ... but because he founded the Hole in the Wall and created an incredibly successful food company to fund it. The Hole in the Wall, in case you never heard of it is an amazing summer camp for terminally ill, handicapped, or disadvantaged children. Now ... that's my idea of a hero ... someone who uses their talent to help others. Another phrase for personal hero would be "person I admire deeply." For some people (to my mind, sadly) that's Paris Hilton ... but then again, who we admire and why we admire them generally changes as we mature (I was going to say "age" ... but some people never mature, even though they age). Hell, if you had asked me who my all time hero was when I was five, I'm certain I would have said Crusader Rabbit. A cartoon character?? Well, sure ... why not.
OK ... then we have the person who I would call an "everyday" hero. Again, your mileage may vary ... but these are the people who put themselves in peril damn near every working day to help others. The firefighters who were running up into the Twin Towers as the people inside were running down to get the hell out ... those guys, whether they died or survived ... those are everyday heroes. They don't think twice, they just do their job ... and their job requires heroics on a regular basis.
Then, there are the people who, I probably wouldn't call heroes ... but if DG wants to consider them as everyday heroes, I certainly won't stop her. Those are the people, like some of the teachers I had in school, who if you knew what they were going through in their personal lives ... you would honestly wonder how the hell they made it through the day without shooting themselves .... but there they are, every day, doing their job and doing it well, and often making the lives of their students the better for having them as a teacher.
And .... of course, there are the regular "just plain heroes" ... those people who do something at potential cost to themselves of their life or their freedom, because it's the "right thing to do." Many of them live within the bounds of their society ... nothing unusual about them .... and then circumstances put them in a situation where they simply have to act ... and the choice they make is absolutely heroic. Now, sometimes, with those types of heroes ... it's a fine line between "how heroic" and "what was that idiot thinking???" Like the guy who jumps in the river to try and save a drowning boy ... not considering that he himself can't swim ... so they both drown. Hero or complete idiot?? It's arguable. If by some quirk of fate the man had successfully saved the boy and survived, I don't think there would be much of a debate. They'd be having ticker tape parades for him.
But, just being out of the ordinary doesn't mean you cannot live within certain societal bounds. I'm pretty certain that every scientist on my personal heroes list has cheated on his wife. That's a given ... all the way to Hawking. They may all have been complete and total dicks ... as mentioned, that doesn't make them more or less extraordinary ... even the most conventional and ordinary person can be a total dick.
And .... well, I don't know about Dr. Tyson ... and I'm not certain that you would have heard of him outside of the US. But, he is a brilliant person and seems to be a really wonderful human being. And, I love the fact that young Black children can watch this wonderful, intelligent, articulate man on the TV teaching them all about particle physics or the big bang or evolution and see that not every Black male is a success because they can sing, dance, play a sport, or because they sell drugs (or some combination of the above). Yep ... he is definitely on my personal heroes list. And, even if I were to find out that he's a dick and cheats on his wife, I doubt that would knock him off of the list. I don't ask my heroes (personal or otherwise) to be super human ... at least not since I turned about 12.