Hi, I'm Jeffrey Kluger for Time and we're here today to ask questions of Stephen Hawking, perhaps the world's best-known
Living cosmologists Physicist and Mathematician.
Hawking is known as much for the body of his work as for the obstacles he's had to overcome to conduct that work.
Ill with ALS or Lou Gehrig's Disease since 1962,
Hawking has been confined to a wheelchair and has been fully paralyzed for several decades. That hasn't stopped him
,however, from producing six popular science books including the recently released
The Grand Design and two children's books written with his daughter Lucy. We sent your questions to Dr.
Hawking three weeks in advance and in that time he assembled his answers one letter at a [time] by computer and
then expressed them through a voice synthesis system.
Stephen Hawking will now take your questions.
We have a question from Stamford Connecticut, [if] somehow you could say something to Albert Einstein what would you Say?
I would ask him why he didn't believe in black holes.
The field equations of his General Theory of Relativity
implied that a large star or a cloud of gas would collapse in on itself and form a black hole.
Einstein was aware [of] this but somehow managed to convince himself that
something like an explosion would always occur to throw off mass and prevent the formation of a black hole.
What if there was no explosion? Do you think our civilization will survive long enough to make the leap to deeper space?
I think we have a good chance of surviving long enough to colonize the solar system.
However, there is nowhere else in the solar system anything like as suitable as the Earth.
So, it is not clear if we would survive if the Earth was made unfit for habitation.
To ensure our long-term survival, we need to reach the stars
That will Take much longer
Let's hope, we can last until then
The You Feel that your Physical Limitations Have Helped
Or Hindered your Study Although I was unfortunate Enough to get Motor Neurone Disease
I have been very Fortunate in Almost everything else [I]
Was lucky to be Working in Theoretical Physics?
[One] of the few [Areas] in Which Disability was not [a] serious handicap [when] to hit the Deck but With my Popular Books
What Scientific Discovery or technological Advancement Would you like to see realized in Your Lifetime [I]?
Would like Nuclear Fusion to become a practical power source
That Would Provide an Inexhaustible Supply of Energy Without Pollution or global Warming I
Guess Everyone here will be asking you Questions About the Deepest Mysteries of the Universe
[so] i will ask Something more Mundane
What is your Favorite Memory?
That was when [I] visited Antarctica?
1997
The Chilean Air Force Flew A Group of Theoretical physicists Down to Their Base on King George Island of the
Antarctica Peninsula
My Wheelchair Didn't have no Chains but They took me Round on A snowmobile
Does the Universe end if so what is Beyond it?
Observations Indicate That The Universe is Expanding at an Ever-Increasing rate
It will expand Forever Getting emptier and Darker
Although The Universe doesn't Have an end it Had a beginning in The big Bang
One might Ask what Is before that but the answer Is that There Is nowhere before The big Bang
Just as There Is [nowhere] South of the South pole Does it Feel like a Huge
Responsibility To Have People Expecting you to have all the answers to [all] of life's Mysteries I
Certainly don't have the answer to all life's Problems
While Physics and Mathematics May Tell Us how the Universe Began They are not much News in Predicting Human
Behavior Because There Are far Too Many
Equations To Solve [I]
Am No Better Than any [When] [else] at. Understanding what Makes People Tick
Particularly Women