• Question: Who would you consider to be your idol? Scientist or otherwise

    Asked by aoifeomara to Arlene, Colin, David, Eugene, Paul on 14 Nov 2012.
    • Photo: David McKeown

      David McKeown answered on 14 Nov 2012:

      Richard Feynman. He was a great Physicist and was also pretty good at playing the bongos. He was a great speaker and really great teacher. He had a great sense of adventure and liked to play lots of practical jokes on people. When he worked on top secret projects he would crack the safes and lock pick draws with all the secrets, just to have some fun with his bosses.

    • Photo: Paul Higgins

      Paul Higgins answered on 18 Nov 2012:

      I was inspired by my high school physics teacher, Ms. Triggs, who got me interested in becoming a scientist.

      Right now I think my idol is Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who is incredibly smart but is also great at making science exciting and interesting to the public. For instance he noticed that the stars in a scene at the end of the film, Titanic, were in the wrong place for the time of year. He wrote to the director, and he helped them fix the scene in the movie!

      He was a host on Nova, which was previously hosted by Carl Sagan, another hero of science!

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