Ask HN: Who is your hero?

To chose one hero would be too tough. I try to incorporate the best qualities of my heroes into my life. There are close family members and friends whom, I respect and love. For many reasons. There are everyday heroes, we just don't get to know as many of them. Impact on people's live is relative, alot of the people we read about have a small impact on many peoples lives. These people have had a huge impact on a couple of people's lives.

Speaking of small impact on many people's lives, I absolutely love to read biographies/profiles of people and companies. Some of my favorites include: Abe Lincoln, Ben Franklin, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, Aldo Leopold, Jerry Garcia, Einstein, Alan Turing, Ted Turner, Brian Cranston, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Bernie Sanders, Richard Branson, and so many more...

And then there's people like Jesus, Marcus Aurelius, Marx, and the Budda. Who seem to have made an impact on another order of magnitude.

(Not joking about Jesus... I'm not necessarily religious but Jesus was a radical dude who lived a radical life and spoke radical messages. Pretty cool when you think about it in a historical context. There are some valuable lessons to be learned from him.)

Even after knowing and reading about the stories of many great people who have lead unique and innovative lives. I still am blown away by the life of Marcus Aurelius. His life was a rare intersection of power, compassion, philosophy, and understanding. Reading Meditations was a major inflection point in my life. I try to emulate his example in some ways.

My heroes on the computing world:

    Claude Shannon
        As important, or more important, than Alan Turing.
        we owe digital electronics to him!!

    John McCarthy
        Invented (or perhaps "discovered") Lisp

    Seymour Papert
        invented LOGO and thus
        brought Lisp to little kids

    Alan Kay
        invented Smalltalk-72 to bring OOP
        to little kids.

    Ivan Sutherland
        Computer graphics pioneer

    Douglas Engelbart
        mouse, hypertext, GUI... see "the mother
        of all demos." Hugely influential.

and...

    Everybody at Xerox PARC in the 70s and 80s.

My great-grandmother, who at the age of 14 traveled halfway around the world on her own to start a new life in a country with more opportunity than the one she left.