RIP: Dr. Stephen Hawking

One of the greatest living Physicists passed away today and what made Hawking more remarkable is that he pushed on through despite ALS slowly destroying his body. I think he’s one of the longest surviving people to have the disease.

I will need to raise his dumbed-down version of his famous book, A Brief History of Time up in my reading queue on my iPad or get a physical copy.

Not to brag, but I had heard of Hawking in high school during the Eighties because Time magazine put him on the cover and said he was the next Einstein. Sadly, I cannot find an image of said cover. Never gave him another thought until Hawking was mentioned in a Geena Davis interview.

Hawking will definitely be well remembered thanks to his willingness to participate in comedy. He made four memorable appearances in my life.

  • The Simpsons in which he critiqued the utopia Lisa and the other Mensa members tried to create. Homer mistook him for Larry Flynt.
  • Futurama several times. A Time Ranger and critic of Professor Farnsworth’s unified theory to everything.
  • Finally, the ultimate nerd out, playing poker with Albert Einstein and Sir Isaac Newton in the Holodeck while conversing about Science with Mr. Data.
  • Doing a bit with the Monty Python crew.

Near the end of his life, Hawking made some pretty dire warnings regarding encountering aliens, developing AIs and our failure to slow Climate Change. Let’s hope he’s wrong on two out of three.

I want to close with one his famous quotes:

“Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious. And however difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at. It matters that you don’t just give up.”`

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