Re:Hawking Hawking: The Selling of a Scientific Celebrity
by williamtrask on Saturday March 12, 2022 @12:42PM
(#30653129)
I think a comparison of the relative impact of Nobel Prize winners and Olympic gold medal winners would dispute your claim regarding moral worth. I can’t think of an athletic equivalent to the invention of vaccines, solar power, democracy, the internet, or even the concept of morality itself.
Re:Hawking Hawking: The Selling of a Scientific Celebrity
by Alekhine on Saturday March 12, 2022 @05:35PM
(#30655640)
In the grand scheme, those things are more important. But coming up with an idea or solving a puzzle does not make a person better than another. Getting an Olympic medal could take equivalent effort to making a major scientific breakthrough. Its just that the kind of effort being made is different.
Re:Hawking Hawking: The Selling of a Scientific Celebrity
by Ar-Curunir on Saturday March 12, 2022 @02:36PM
(#30654177)
By that metric, most people are worthless.
I still don't like sports culture, but I appreciate athleticism much more now. Intelligence, while important, is not the sole measure of a persons value, and its not a bad thing for a culture to value physicality. It's a very human thing, just like curiosity or creativity. Of course it would be nicer if we valued intellect to the same degree, but here we are.
Point is, its not just kicking a ball. Its a lifetime of work and passion. A scientist does not have greater moral worth than an athlete or artist. These aren't worthless pursuits only idiots focus on.