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Jan 7, 2011
"To call someone a hero means - I'd decide what to do by asking what they'd do in the same situation. That's a stricter standard than admiration." --Paul Graham
Can Science Create Heroes?
Can modern science help us to create heroes? That's the lofty question behind the Heroic Imagination Project, a new nonprofit started by Phil Zimbardo, a psychologist at Stanford University. Heroism isn't supposed to be a teachable trait. We assume that people like Gandhi or Rosa Parks or the 9/11 hero Todd Beamer have some intangible quality that the rest of us lack. When we get scared and selfish, these brave souls find a way to act, to speak out, to help others in need. That's why they're heroes. Zimbardo rejects this view. "We've been saddled for too long with this mystical view of heroism," he says. "A hero is just an ordinary person who does something extraordinary. I believe we can use science to teach people how to do that."
BE THE CHANGE
Make a list of your heroes. Is there a pattern? (It means those are the qualities you'd like to see most in yourself!)
