Notable Death Today

[oldpaul]

One of the great minds the world has ever seen died today. Physicist Stephen Hawking passed away at seventy six years. A loss to us all I say. Einstein brought physics to scientists, Stephen Hawking brought it to the rest of us. It is unusual for someone with ALS to live as long as he did. Another fine Englishman. Sympathy to those who loved him. Tom

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[CINDERS]

One wonders if Stephen had not been afflicted with such a terrible disease just how far he would have taken us along with the likes of Oppenheimer, Telsa & Eisenstein. RIP

[Gil Boyd]

He really suffered all of his life, except for his time at University in his early years, when he was relatively fit.
Sad loss to the country, but in some ways a blessing to see the pain ended!

[speckles]

I watch life everyday and try to do what I can to make it better for folks. One thing I have come to understand; there are disease processes that people live with that are worse than death itself. Having said that, I am not living in their shoes so it's hard to say. Hawkin might not have accomplished what he did if he was not confined to his "little" world. Genius made super genius .. what a man!

[Patrick Chadwick]

The death of Stephen Hawking has a special resonance for me, as my life has a number of parallels , but running a couple of years later. My family also moved to St. Albans while I was at primary school. Like him, I passed the "eleven plus" examination and was awarded a free place at St. Albans School. We must have had the same physics and maths teachers. I also won a minor scholarship to University College, where I studied physics with the same tutor - Robert Berman, now deceased.

So much for the parallels. Unlike Stephen, I was a theoretical flop, never having got past the imaginary world of atoms as tiny billiard balls whizzing round a cluster of heavier balls. But Stephen Hawking truly operated on a higher mental level, and in the end, it must literally have been his brain that kept him going as his direct experience of the physical world dwindled away.

An awesome example of how mind can triumph over the fragile matter of a human body.

[Sarge1998]

Not a fan, I question the responses that were published. My opinion is not popular but it is like everything an opinion.

[Aragorn243]

I'm not a fan either. Learning about his early life made me even less so. I do agree with some posts that he may never have acquired his "greatness" had he not been confined to his brain. But then again, I don't agree with many of his ideas, not science perhaps but personal, religious and political views.

[Gil Boyd]

In some ways, his science has been a lot of guess work and probabilities, the same as medical opinions. Both have been going since man arrived on this planet, but if you are in the minority who can understand all that squiggle on the blackboard good luck to you, clearly he did. The only thing there I ever retained and of use in some shape or form was pi = 3.14 brought to us by the Greeks
Now would I go fly into a black hole and come out the other side, I don't think so. Its just a hole with darkness the other side.....................but did we actually go to the moon??

[CINDERS]

Actually a black hole can trap light somewhere from the back of my singular brain cell I remember if the earth went through a black hole it would be compressed into the size of a matchbox!
I bet Socrates had his detractors as well Gil, but in those days if you were not liked you never got voted out you got rubbed out just ask Julius Caesar.......!

[muffett.2008]

That's fitting Cinders, today being the Ides of March