Media Moguls can Say Stupid Things, Too!

In all fairness to Michael Bloomberg, he was probably speaking as a mayor, rather than the founder of a major successful media corporation, when, in response to the news that Police Detective James Zadroga may have been on drugs during those months when he was doing his job in the contaminated air at the 9/11 "ground zero" site, the current mayor of New York declared that "the science says this was not a hero." Has it ever been the business of science to define the concept of "hero" or characterize the nature of the heroic act? Is Bloomberg so dense that he can reject the social world (which is the only venue in which heroism can be meaningful) in favor of the objective world of science? Apparently, it is again necessary to invoke the spirit of Carl Gustav Jung, who was perceptive enough to recognize that "those heroes of olden time must have led a none too scrupulous life, and indeed not a single myth, Greek or otherwise, claims that they ever did anything else. All that beauty could revel in its existence only because there was as yet no penal code and no guardian of public morals." Whether as mayor or as media mogul, Bloomberg seems to be suffering from a significant case of limited reading matter!