RIP Stephen Hawking

Overrated physicist. Most people who praise him don't even understand basic physics.

I'm suspicious of the strong possibility that many of those who praise him are the same who like Ed Sheeran, Katy 'Nun taken' Perry, or Pop Idol.

Do they identify quite so strongly with him not because of his intellect, let alone because they've read or understood his books, but because they like to tie their mast to someone whose medical condition reflects their own psychological sense of vulnerability?

I know how stupid the world en masse is and I know that the passing of , say, Witgenstein, would have probably resulted in grudging admiration at best but with a lot fo snide asides about being 'full of himself' or 'aloof'.

I'm suspicious of the strong possibility that many of those who praise him are the same who like Ed Sheeran, Katy 'Nun taken' Perry, or Pop Idol.

Do they identify quite so strongly with him not because of his intellect, let alone because they've read or understood his books, but because they like to tie their mast to someone whose medical condition reflects their own psychological sense of vulnerability?

I know how stupid the world en masse is and I know that the passing of , say, Witgenstein, would have probably resulted in grudging admiration at best but with a lot fo snide asides about being 'full of himself' or 'aloof'.

Are you for real? You don't need to have understood his books to realise that without people like him, we'd all be travelling in a very different direction, you included. The fact that his work encouraged someone to pick up a Physics or an Astronomy book instead of another type of 'book' says it all. I didn't understand his book either and gave up a few pages in, but I then sought out another, easier book on space. I could have, of course, spent that time reading something else - and what a waste that would have been. Thank you, Stephen Hawking.

Professor Hawking had a razor sharp wit:


During an appearance on Last Week Tonight with Jon Oliver, the host asked Hawking: ‘You have stated that you believe that there could be an infinite number of parallel universes. Does that mean there is a universe out there where I am smarter than you?’ To which, Prof Hawking hit back: ‘Yes. And also a universe where you are funny.’

I'm suspicious of the strong possibility that many of those who praise him are the same who like Ed Sheeran, Katy 'Nun taken' Perry, or Pop Idol.

Do they identify quite so strongly with him not because of his intellect, let alone because they've read or understood his books, but because they like to tie their mast to someone whose medical condition reflects their own psychological sense of vulnerability?

I know how stupid the world en masse is and I know that the passing of , say, Witgenstein, would have probably resulted in grudging admiration at best but with a lot fo snide asides about being 'full of himself' or 'aloof'.

That is a big coincidence indeed.

Missed yeah, but not forget. Great personalities are never dead forever, their great ideas, their achievements as their legacy always left behind. And so I think he will influence the (astro-)physics even over his death.

He was no philosopher!" In fact, he said 'Philosophy is dead'. And,no, this kind of anti-philosophy isn't itself a kind of philosophy.

Tell me how I would be 'travelling in a very different direction'.If reading 'something else' would have been a waste to you then that shows that you've got a narrow interest. That's OK but it wouldn't have necessarily been a waste to me to read 'something else' e.g. a book on art or philosophy.

I'm pleased that Stephen Hawking pleased other people and contributed towards science. But many of you are hardly good examples of science yourselves as a result as you're not stating logical arguments even in a short post. So how beneficial was he to most people really aside from the subjectivity that he was inspirational (I'll agree that it's objective that he was inspirational to many though) Many people in many fields are, or should be, potentially inspirational. When people mix the logical and the emotive it tends to diminish both.

"Tell me how I would be 'travelling in a very different direction'."

You wouldn't be writing this on your computer for a start. You'd most likely be sitting in a cave or dying at 40 after spending your life ploughing a field, if people like Stephen Hawking had decided to write a trashy novel or study the bible instead of doing his physics (there's room for these, of course, but they are not going to produce technology, cure cancer or improve everyone’s quality of life. Studying a painting, as lovely or important as it is, will NOT produce space travel (offshoots of this research have been used in the health setting), an electric car (no oil), a cure for testicular cancer (which now has a cure rate of nearly 100%) or allow disabled people to communicate with others around the world via the internet). He was a part of this. That’s the second point. The fact that he achieved 1) despite his terrible health problems (his second wife said that his death would be a relief to him) is astounding. So, on these two counts, people can't find it in their hearts to celebrate the man?