Stephen Hawking - a trapped soul wandering the universe

Over the years, we have covered this one of a kind man on the Scientist website, whose eightieth birthday the world celebrates with the help of a Google doodle. Although he has not been with us for three years, the idea of ​​a soul trapped in a limited body, wandering in the expanses of space is what gave him a unique status, and he used it, among other things, to promote scientific and rational thinking * The science site summarizes the eighty faces of Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking who died three years ago was a cultural icon at least as much as he was a scientist. He can be remembered for the physics of black holes and the beginning of the universe, his joining the Breakthru ventures, the promotion of rationalism and scientific thinking, and yes, atheistic thinking as well. But most of all, he will be remembered as the most famous person with disabilities, who proved that you shouldn't let even a particularly challenging disability get in the way of your thinking.

• What is the muscular dystrophy ALS that Stephen Hawking has?

As mentioned, Hawking was also a cultural hero, and among other things he appeared in "The Simpsons" and "Star Trek: The Next Generation". From 1979 to 2009 he held the Lukes Chair of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge, the chair held by Isaac Newton before him. Among his most notable books was "A Brief History of Time", which sold more than nine million copies.

But first, the man was a rock star. In his lecture at the Hebrew University during his last visit to Israel, in 2006, the hall was full to the brim. He sat in the center of the stage on the wheelchair, all the time in the same position, but from his computer, which served as a paw, important voices emanated. Prof. Hawking dedicated the event to reviewing the current knowledge about the Big Bang, and what happened after it. In a rather rare move, the British Embassy provided journalists with the full transcript of the lecture, and of course we took advantage of the opportunity:

• Stephen Hawking's lecture "The Origin of the Universe" at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, December 14, 2006 (The writer of these lines was present in the hall)

From a scientific point of view, he will be remembered as the one who studied perhaps the most important phenomenon in the universe - the black holes and in particular the Hawking radiation, according to which the possibility of matter exiting the black hole is not hermetically sealed, and that there is radiation that reduces the black holes, even if the time span in which it operates is huge, so they did not take it into account. The work of Stephen Hawking On the subject of black holes and the origin of the universe is perhaps the most real progress that theoretical physicists have made towards a single theory of everything - a theory that sits between Einstein's theory of gravity and quantum physics.

In an interview with the Hidan site, Prof. Zvi Piren from the Hebrew University explains that "theHawking's discussion of the black holes drew attention to the need to unify the fundamental teachings in science". The disconnect between phenomena that occur on a large scale, such as galaxies or even the universe itself, and quantum theory, which is measured in very short distances, also occupied Einstein in the same context he stated Hawking because it would have been better if the Higgs particle had not been discovered. His intention was that the Higgs strengthens the standard model of particle physics, and still does not resolve the gap between the theories. In an article from 2011 taken from their joint book, Hawking and Prof. Leonard Melodino explain that it is still difficult to understand how to link the theory of classical physics with the quantum one, but several theories are offered.

Hawking addressed almost every topic in the world, starting with topics related to his research, for example" Time travel is possible but only to the future or his assessment that Aliens exist but they are mostly more primitive than us.

Hawking also spoke out on issues unrelated to the universe or physics. For example, he opposed the further development of the field of artificial intelligence due to the ability to use it as a weapon. Speaking at the opening of the Laverholm Center for the Future of Intelligence (LCFI) at the University of Cambridge, Hawking said that AI will be "the best thing, or the worst thing, that will ever happen to humanity", it all depends on how it is handled.

But of course one of the issues identified with him was atheism. At every opportunity he said "There is no heaven: it's a fabric story", including at the Vatican conference. The filmmakers too "The Theory of Everything" - a sort of biography of Stephen Hawking Place the God as a secondary character in the film, a factor that affects, among other things, his relationship with his first wife.

Shortly before his death, Hawking donated his prestige to a series of privately funded scientific projects, Mainly from the billionaires Yuri Milner and Mark Zuckerberg. In the report we wrote that: Space entrepreneurs and the physicist Stephen Hawking teamed up for a project to develop a spacecraft that will travel at a speed of 150 million kilometers per hour to the stars within a generation. A starshot nano spacecraft of which thousands of copies will fly to Alpha Centauri and arrive within 20 years A starshot nano spacecraft of which thousands of copies will fly to Alpha Centauri and arrive within 20 years A research and engineering program worth 100 million dollars will seek to demonstrate the ability to use light rays to launch a nanometer spacecraft in the first stage at a speed of 20% from the speed of light. Such a mission could reach Alpha Centauri within 20 years of launch.

The person chosen to manage the project is an Israeli - Prof. Avi Leib from Harvard University. We covered this in the article: The Israeli astrophysicist's journey to Proxima Centauri.

Before his passing, we were able to summarize his life's work:

• Stephen Hawking's swan song as a sign of farewell to humanity
• Prof. Stephen Hawking died in his sleep * He studied black holes and was a social activist