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I’m kinda over the hero thing.

In contrast to their ancient origins in epic poetry and lofty myths, heroes and heroism today seem to have gotten wrapped up in our cultural view of altruism.

Although the meaning of “hero” is in that delicious group of highly subjective nouns that people love to debate, I tend to think it’s a bad idea to call those who engage in good and generous acts “heroes.”

Adorable child superheroes aside, when we conflate superhero stories with commonplace altruism, it implies that acts of goodness and giving are somehow extraordinary and outside the range of normal behavior.

In Elizabeth Svoboda’s new book What Makes a Hero? The Surprising Science of Selflessness, the author attempts to reveal whether or not this is true. Is it normal for humans to be generous? What would possess someone to rush into a burning building to save another person? Why would someone who lives in poverty donate money to a charity?

The book presents an interesting overview of scientific research related to the study of altruism. Moving from evolutionary biology’s conversations about why helping others is beneficial for us as a species, to the economics of helping, into psychology and neuroscience, Svoboda rounds up some truly fascinating findings.

Brain researchers like Jordan Grafman, for example, have traced altruism to surprising parts of our brains:

“While we often tend to think of altruism as a kind of sophisticated moral capacity we use to squelch our urges to dominate others,” Svoboda writes, “new evidence suggests that giving is actually inherently rewarding: The brain churns out a pleasurable response when we engage in it.”

Oxytocin-releasing acts like charitable giving and volunteering seem to translate to improvements in our overall health and well-being. A University of Michigan study found that older adults who reported helping others regularly were 60% less likely to die during the five years of the study than the non-helping control group, for example.

But Svoboda doesn’t just examine the theoretical study of selflessness. She also examines the practice of “heroism” today, speaking extensively with psychologist and Stanford professor emeritus Phil Zimbardo who designed the famed Stanford Prison Experiment. Today Zimbardo studies the practice of goodness and has helped to develop a “heroic education curriculum” to encourage young people to be “everyday heroes.”

By presenting examples of “heroes in training,” like students at the ARISE High School in Oakland which put Zimbardo’s curriculum into practice, Svoboda tries to identify how all of us can train ourselves to be heroes. Her findings are essentially that we need to: a) be aware of what makes a hero (the science behind it, understanding altruism), and b) try to put everyday heroism into practice.

Svoboda ends the book by asking, “What excuse do any of us have to hold back from fulfilling our heroic destiny?”

While this question is posed to inspire the reader’s imagination, it strikes me as a loaded sentiment. Why does heroism have to be a “destiny”—why can’t it just be who we are? Instead of focusing on extreme self-sacrifice, it might be more realistic to focus on small acts. Instead of trying to be heroes, let’s try to be humans.

What I think would be an interesting subject for Svoboda’s next book is the science of collaboration. Instead of examining what makes us heroic as individuals, I’m more curious about our combined efforts as groups (such as in Idealist’s new network!). How can we better foster teamwork between people, and what’s holding us back from doing this more of the time?

I say we ditch the capes and capers of conflating heroism with everyday goodness. But maybe that’s just me. What do you think?

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