Who Are Your Heroes?

  • Thread starter Thread starter 1MileCrash
  • Start date Start date
AI Thread Summary
The discussion centers on the concept of heroes and influential figures in personal and professional lives. Participants share a diverse range of heroes, including historical figures, professors, and personal mentors. Notable mentions include mathematicians like Gauss and Euler, philosophers such as Socrates and Marcus Aurelius, and cultural icons like Jimmy Page and George Carlin. A recurring theme is the impact of parents as primary heroes, with many noting their influence over public figures. Some participants express a preference for finding personal paths to success rather than following others blindly. The conversation also touches on the significance of contributions to fields like neuroscience, highlighting figures like Walter Freeman III for their profound influence on both science and personal perspectives. Overall, the thread emphasizes the varied sources of inspiration and respect that shape individuals' lives and careers.
1MileCrash
Messages
1,338
Reaction score
41
Who are your heroes? Who are the people that influenced your career, behavior, or success in the biggest way? Who do you hold high respect for? Who inspires you?

My list is as follows:

All of my math professors and one of my physics professors, a select few if my classmates whom I looked up to.

Cato the Younger
Gauss
Van Gogh
Euler
Cauchy
Erdos
Feynman
Tyson
Diogenes
Euclid
Marcus Aurelius
Epictetus
Socrates

Etc.
 
  • Like
Likes Aufbauwerk 2045
Physics news on Phys.org
Jimmy page
 
WannabeNewton said:
Jimmy page


Nice
 
Actually I think hero would be putting it lightly. Jimmy page is my god. I have had an almost childish admiration for him for years now that I certainly don't have for anyone else alive or dead. He's the sole reason I started playing guitar.
 
Reminds me of the time some years ago when I did some volunteer work with kids aged about 12 through 16. From all walks of life and backgrounds. About a dozen different groups of 10 to 50 kids over the years.

I would ask them who their hero was, or who they respected and admired the most.

The number one answer was always the same.

It wasn't a sports figure, or pop star, or rapper, or movie/tv actor or actress.

The number one answer , year after year, group after group, may or may not surprise you.

"My Parent(s)".

And now you know the rest of the story.

Good Day!
 
  • Like
Likes Aufbauwerk 2045
W0AFQ : Lester A Anderson - Taught me a lot of electronics

Robert Bearse, Professor Emeritus - Taught me a lot of Physics with 4 MeV particle accelerator.

attachment.php?attachmentid=71563&stc=1&d=1406105094.jpg
 

Attachments

  • rcbearse.jpg
    rcbearse.jpg
    38.3 KB · Views: 555
I am impressed by people's accomplishments but I just don't admire any person in particular. I think too many people try too hard to blindly follow someone else's footstep instead finding their own ways to succeed.

Having said that, George Carlin is a ****ing genius.
 
wukunlin said:
I am impressed by people's accomplishments but I just don't admire any person in particular. I think too many people try too hard to blindly follow someone else's footstep instead finding their own ways to succeed.

Exactly my sentiments about this matter.
 
Thanks for this thread 1MileCrash. There is one person who really had a huge influence in my life, not only professionally but personally and spiritually. The reason I am thanking you is that if I started the thread myself, it would unequivocally brand myself as obsequious. So now I can just blame you. Lol.

This person is Walter Freeman (III), whom I reference frequently here, so it's no mystery, but here's an opportunity to present my gratefulness to him in a formal context. It's difficult really to classify him, which is an immediate indication of his genius. His knowledge and contributions to neuroscience just span and transcend so many disciplines he really is in a class all his own. He single-handedly set the standard on how to understand large scale dynamic intertactions in the brain with his landmark book, "Mass action in the nervous system", along with several hundred journal publications. This book was decades ahead of its time and preguessed a lot of what resting state network fMRI studies would bear out 30 years later.

He was (is) a self-proclaimed biophysicist but waxed philosophic prose that rivaled any of the classics, and had the biophysical street cred to back it up. I can honestly say I did not only learn neurobiology from this person, I learned a new way to look at life in general, which was invaluable. If you want a great popular book to read by him, try "Society of brains" https://www.amazon.com/dp/0805820175/?tag=pfamazon01-20

The impact he has had on the wealth of graduate students that have moved through his lab is telling. I wasn't one of them personally, but I know a number of them, and the impact on them goes much deeper than just a professional association. Here's an example of the regard he is held to. Leslie Kay's "10 things I learned from Walter."

https://archive.org/details/Brain_Network_Dynamics_2007-04_Leslie_Kay

It goes a lot deeper than just the hard science, and for that he is my hero (along with Einstein and George Carlin, nod to Wukunlin)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #10
1MileCrash said:
Who are your heroes? Who are the people that influenced your career, behavior, or success in the biggest way? Who do you hold high respect for? Who inspires you?

My list is as follows:

All of my math professors and one of my physics professors, a select few if my classmates whom I looked up to.

Cato the Younger
Gauss
Van Gogh
Euler
Cauchy
Erdos
Feynman
Tyson
Diogenes
Euclid
Marcus Aurelius
Epictetus
Socrates

Etc.

You sure do have an impressive list of professors and classmates...
 
  • #11
Batman.
 
  • #12
Matterwave said:
You sure do have an impressive list of professors and classmates...


Is that really how that reads?
 
  • #13
I'm surprised this thread has so few responses. Doesn't everyone have at least one hero? I have many.

I will mention one hero who is perhaps not well known in this forum. Business consultant Stafford Beer's theory of cybernetics so impressed President Salvador Allende that he was invited to help run Chile. You can look up the story. Some call Beer "the man who could have run the world." That's how powerful his theory was and is. It's an indication of the importance of cybernetics, not only in science and engineering, but in designing better human systems. We may solve our problems in science and engineering well enough, but until we solve the problem of our planetary social system, we will never realize our full potential.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #14
1MileCrash said:
Who are your heroes? Who are the people that influenced your career, behavior, or success in the biggest way? Who do you hold high respect for? Who inspires you?

My list is as follows:

All of my math professors and one of my physics professors, a select few if my classmates whom I looked up to.

Cato the Younger
Gauss
Van Gogh
Euler
Cauchy
Erdos
Feynman
Tyson
...

Mike Tyson was a great boxer, but not sure you should be letting him influence your behavior.
 
  • #15
Mike Tyson was a great boxer, but not sure you should be letting him influence your behavior.

agree. for boxers, I commend Muhammad Ali
 
  • #16
Aufbauwerk 2045 said:
I'm surprised this thread has so few responses. Doesn't everyone have at least one hero? I have many.

I will mention one hero who is perhaps not well known in this forum. Business consultant Stafford Beer's theory of cybernetics so impressed President Salvador Allende that he was invited to help run Chile. You can look up the story. Some call Beer "the man who could have run the world." That's how powerful his theory was and is. It's an indication of the importance of cybernetics, not only in science and engineering, but in designing better human systems. We may solve our problems in science and engineering well enough, but until we solve the problem of our planetary social system, we will never realize our full potential.
Did you realize that this thread was dead for 3 years?
 
Back
Top