I remember I used to virtually worship or see numerous people as heroes when I was younger. As I became older, which is, well, every day, I forget things (premature senility and dementia) or I lose my way.
Such scientists or people meant something to me, and I never really wrote down who they were, what they meant to me, or why they were gods among men (and women) to me (I don't recall having anything of the sort in any of my dissertations or, less likely, in any publications).
If you can help me or add to my (ever-growing) list, that would be most appreciated. I also would like to hear from you about your heroes, idols, or whatever you call them.
To get the ball rolling:
Dirac: not only is he a fellow graduate of one of my alma maters but I worshipped Dirac for his wit, sharp mind, terseness, and analytical prowess. He wasn't quite an absent-minded boffin as much as, as folks now think, autistic (or of the autistic spectrum). In this regard, I see him as having possibly overcome a barrier that generally prevents folks from becoming one of the most brilliant minds ever. His love life was also most interesting too.
I remember that I worshipped numerous other people like Dirac with respect to his ... personality.
Feynman: a physicist who does his own mathematics, Feynman was a machine in popularising science and formulating some of the most interesting work in quantum mechanics since, well, other brilliant minds. It's to be noted that Feynman also had an interest in biology.
S. Ramanujan: obv.
Stephen Hawking: he wasn't an exam-slaying monster at Oxford but he not only had the heuvos to stand up in a lecture to correct or counter a lecturer but he also stunned his examination board when he gave his vive.
Unfortunately, I don't really have all too many heroes from the supposed fairer sex (that's sexist!). I'm sure you can understand that science wasn't exactly an endeavour that was all too ladylike. That said,
Rosalind Franklin: not only did she do work in crystallography (I still don't understand this, how anyone could possibly do this and not go mad) but she overcame significant barriers in matriculating to Cambridge of all universities as well as in making a name for herself. It's a sad thing that she passed so 'prematurely' (I believe that the Fates cut her string short) and that she isn't given due credit for her work.
More to come. Hopefully, I can hear some of yours.
Hypatia, the last librarian of the Library of Alexandria and one of the first (the first?) women to become a mathematician. She was trampled to death by a Christian mob for being an atheist.
Historically, a few pop into my mind. Marie Curie was a goddamn genius. Linus Pauling is probably the greatest chemist to ever live. Robert Langer is among the most prolific inventors in history.
Ed Boyden is a young professor that not many people have heard of, but he's easily the most impressive mind I've ever met in person. He's ming bogglingly intelligent. I've seen him write different things with both hands simultaneously while carrying on a conversation. The man is on a different cognitive plane.
Barry Marshall in my mind was a great scientist. He and Robin Warren proved that most ulcers were caused by the Helicobacter pylori bacterium. They even won a Nobel Prize for it. It's how he did it that made him so great.
He needed proof, so he drank a petri dish full of H. pylori and a little under 3 days later develop symptoms. Up until then, it was common knowledge that spicy foods and stress caused ulcers. His research and self-experiment showed that to be wrong.
From Wikipedia
After failed attempts to infect piglets in 1984, Marshall, after having a baseline endoscopy done, drank a Petri dish containing cultured H. pylori, expecting to develop, perhaps years later, an ulcer. He was surprised when, only three days later, he developed vague nausea and halitosis, (due to the achlorhydria, there was no acid to kill bacteria in the stomach, and their waste products manifested as bad breath), noticed only by his mother. On days 5–8, he developed achlorydric (no acid) vomiting. On day eight, he had a repeat endoscopy and biopsy, which showed massive inflammation (gastritis), and H. Pylori was cultured. On the fourteenth day after ingestion, a third endoscopy was done, and Marshall began to take antibiotics. This story is related by Barry Marshall himself in his Nobel acceptance lecture Dec. 8, 2005, available for viewing on the Nobel website. Interestingly, Marshall did not develop antibodies to H. pylori, suggesting that innate immunity can sometimes eradicate acute H. pylori infection. Marshall's illness and recovery, based on a culture of organisms extracted from a patient, fulfilled Koch's postulates for H. pylori and gastritis, but not for peptic ulcer. This experiment was published in 1985 in the Medical Journal of Australia, and is among the most cited articles from the journal.[8]
Carl Sagan. I watched Cosmos as part of my studies and didn't feel like it was just something I had to do to get my credits. His books are interesting and easy to understand too - in Billions and Billions he teaches how to sum 1+2+4+8+16+...+2^63 in a way that is understandable to a layman.
There's also Nikola GODDAMN Tesla, but I know less about him than "The Oatmeal is awesome".
If you don't know Albert Einstein already, you should be ashamed.
Bohr is responsible for being one of the first to theoretically predict the location of an electron orbiting an atom. He did a great job with hydrogen, but that is where his model worked and with no other atom. His work did pave the way for other to find a better model for the location of electrons. He is one of the fathers of quantum mechanics and is vastly unknown by the world.
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I have 22 EDH decks. I do not have a single infinite combo nor do I have any Eldrazi. Three of the decks are designed to kill myself as well as who ever else I am playing. I make sure to have at least one dragon in every one of my decks. Not because it's smart, or a good play, but because I play casually and I play to be creative and fun. Not to win. Winning is just a side effect of slamming into someones face with a dragon (or 12) while dealing 30 damage to the board, each player, and myself.
Temple Grandin is pretty much one of my favourite people to have ever existed. Her works in autism advocacy are phenomenal and she has a great mind. Proud to have her here at Colorado State University. Oh, and there's a movie about her. Her books are difficult to read, but it's amazing that they're written by an individual with autism for individuals with autism so that they may be better able to communicate and function in society. You can also check out her TED video!
Nikola Tesla is the guy my father handed me a book about when I was about 7 and after reading it, always wanted to deal with electricity. The mans vision was decades ahead of anyone else. They are still working on his ideas today from 50 years ago.
That being said, I also found George Washington Carver, Edison, Bell, Marconi, and a host of others that worked in the electrical field and more amazing people.
Lavoisier: in the Rev, he lost his head; shame he's dead.
Faraday: autodidact Faraday was also able to reconcile a priori knowledge with a posteriori knowledge, science and faith.
Maxwell
Claude Bernard: I vividly and faithfully recall the lecture in which homeostasis was discussed. It wasn't taught by Bernard, but it involved him, his work, and his elegant experiments. This was one of my earliest lectures and the first of the a-focus-on-physiology lectures.
Jawaharlal Nehru
One of those physicists who wasn't only important in the last century but was also incredibly witty. No, it's not Dirac, who I've already mentioned (but do you know I looove Dirac?).
Heisenberg
Pauli
Schrödinger
Beatrix Potter
Virchow
Versalius
van Leeuwenhoek
Malpighi
Koch
von Laue: oh you crazy crystallographer, even with my background in mathematics, I have no idea what you did!
Salk: a gentleman who pioneered a vaccine and did science not for glory but for love and the love of it.
Grigori Perelman: obv., obv., obv.
Linnaeus
Dalton
de Broglie
Sanger
Eric Lander
Robert Hooke
Adam Smith: not that I agree with everything in his works and scribblings.
Millikan
Young
Cavendish
Adler
Jung
Liebniz
I think Einstein is given too much credit, as wonderful and prescient as his AM publications were, particularly among the lay.
Physicists get too much glory, I reckon.
I still can't remember who the similar-to-Dirac guy is and I still have a massive difference in the numbers of males and of females. I also have numerous names absent or unmentioned, and others that I'm deliberately leaving out due to personal and/or professional and other reasons.
Such scientists or people meant something to me, and I never really wrote down who they were, what they meant to me, or why they were gods among men (and women) to me (I don't recall having anything of the sort in any of my dissertations or, less likely, in any publications).
If you can help me or add to my (ever-growing) list, that would be most appreciated. I also would like to hear from you about your heroes, idols, or whatever you call them.
To get the ball rolling:
— jean-baptiste alphonse karr, les guêpes (1849)
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The first rule of Cursecatcher is, You do not talk about Cursecatcher.
Feynman is the only person whose books I have read.
Ed Boyden is a young professor that not many people have heard of, but he's easily the most impressive mind I've ever met in person. He's ming bogglingly intelligent. I've seen him write different things with both hands simultaneously while carrying on a conversation. The man is on a different cognitive plane.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Snow_(physician)
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He needed proof, so he drank a petri dish full of H. pylori and a little under 3 days later develop symptoms. Up until then, it was common knowledge that spicy foods and stress caused ulcers. His research and self-experiment showed that to be wrong.
From Wikipedia
540 Peasant cube- Gold EditionSomething SpicyBroke the handle off the Broad Street pump and single-handedly invented the fields of epidemiology and public health.
There's also Nikola GODDAMN Tesla, but I know less about him than "The Oatmeal is awesome".
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Big Johnny.
If you don't know Albert Einstein already, you should be ashamed.
Bohr is responsible for being one of the first to theoretically predict the location of an electron orbiting an atom. He did a great job with hydrogen, but that is where his model worked and with no other atom. His work did pave the way for other to find a better model for the location of electrons. He is one of the fathers of quantum mechanics and is vastly unknown by the world.
That being said, I also found George Washington Carver, Edison, Bell, Marconi, and a host of others that worked in the electrical field and more amazing people.
Physicists get too much glory, I reckon.
I still can't remember who the similar-to-Dirac guy is and I still have a massive difference in the numbers of males and of females. I also have numerous names absent or unmentioned, and others that I'm deliberately leaving out due to personal and/or professional and other reasons.
— jean-baptiste alphonse karr, les guêpes (1849)
wiki subforum @ mtgs forums * mtgs wiki * site rules