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In my eulogy for Stephen, at the interment of his ashes at Westminster Abbey, I memorialised that struggle with these words: ‘Newton gave us answers. Hawking gave us questions. And Hawking’s questions themselves keep on giving, generating breakthroughs decades later. When ultimately we master the quantum gravity laws, and comprehend fully the birth of our universe, it may largely be by standing on the shoulders of Hawking.’
The problem is, most people believe that real science is too difficult and complicated for them to understand. But I don’t think this is the case. To do research on the fundamental laws that govern the universe would require a commitment of time that most people don’t have; the world would soon grind to a halt if we all tried to do theoretical physics. But most people can understand and appreciate the basic ideas if they are presented in a clear way without equations, which I believe is possible and which is something I have enjoyed trying to do throughout my life.
perspective it has given humanity on ourselves. When we see the Earth from space, we see ourselves as a whole. We see the unity, and not the divisions. It is such a simple image with a compelling message; one planet, one human race.
After my expectations had been reduced to zero, every new day became a bonus, and I began to appreciate everything I did have. While there’s life, there is hope.
I have been to the furthest reaches of our galaxy, travelled into a black hole and gone back to the beginning of time. On Earth, I have experienced highs and lows, turbulence and peace, success and suffering. I have been rich and poor, I have been able-bodied and disabled. I have been praised and criticised, but never ignored. I have been enormously privileged, through my work, in being able to contribute to our understanding of the universe. But it would be an empty universe indeed if it were not for the people I love, and who love me. Without them, the wonder of it all would be lost on me.
Be brave, be curious, be determined, overcome the odds. It can be done.
As I was growing up in England after the Second World War, it was a time of austerity. We were told that you never get something for nothing. But now, after a lifetime of work, I think that actually you can get a whole universe for free.
So what does this mean in our quest to find out if there is a God? It means that if the universe adds up to nothing, then you don’t need a God to create it. The universe is the ultimate free lunch.
Something very wonderful happened to time at the instant of the Big Bang. Time itself began.
You can’t get to a time before the Big Bang because there was no time before the Big Bang. We have finally found something that doesn’t have a cause, because there was no time for a cause to exist in. For me this means that there is no possibility of a creator, because there is no time for a creator to have existed in.
We have this one life to appreciate the grand design of the universe, and for that I am extremely grateful.
Einstein objected strongly to the idea that the universe is governed by chance. His feelings were summed up in his dictum ‘God does not play dice.’ But all the evidence is that God is quite a gambler.
The Anthropic Principle says that the universe has to be more or less as we see it, because if it were different there wouldn’t be anyone here to observe it.
surroundings increases by a greater amount. This is what happens in a living being. We can define life as an ordered system that can keep itself going against the tendency to disorder and can reproduce itself. That is, it can make similar, but independent, ordered systems.
We are more than just our genes. We may be no stronger or inherently more intelligent than our caveman ancestors. But what distinguishes us from them is the knowledge that we have accumulated over the last 10,000 years, and particularly over the last 300. I think it is legitimate to take a broader view and include externally transmitted information, as well as DNA, in the evolution of the human race.
Meeting a more advanced civilisation, at our present stage, might be a bit like the original inhabitants of America meeting Columbus – and I don’t think they thought they were better off for it.
People have searched for mini black holes of this mass, but have so far not found any. This is a pity because, if they had, I would have got a Nobel Prize.
It is the past that tells us who we are. Without it, we lose our identity.
There was a young lady of Wight Who travelled much faster than light She departed one day In a relative way And arrived on the previous night.
Whereas the short-term impact of AI depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.
Intelligence is characterised as the ability to adapt to change. Human intelligence is the result of generations of natural selection of those with the ability to adapt to changed circumstances. We must not fear change. We need to make it work to our advantage.
Why are we so worried about artificial intelligence? Surely humans are always able to pull the plug? People asked a computer, ‘Is there a God?’ And the computer said, ‘There is now,’ and fused the plug.
