The final book from Stephen Hawking, the late theoretical physicist and cosmologist, was released on Tuesday under the title Brief Answers to the big question.Hawking, who died in March, answers questions like “Is there a God?” and “Is time travel possible?” in his final book.
Hawking, who lived most of his life with the neurodegenerative disorder amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), was still working on the book when he died in March. The work was completed by his family and publishers, who filled in the gaps by drawing on an “enormous personal archive” of essays, interviews and articles from Hawking’s half-century career.
Brief Answers to the big Question is divided into 10 chapters, each of which is posed as a question: “What is inside a black hole?”, “How did it all begin?” and “Is there a God?” Hawking’s answer to the God question is a resounding “no.”
“There is no God. No one directs the universe,” he writes. “For centuries, it was believed that disabled people like me were living under a curse that was inflicted by God. I prefer to think that everything can be explained another way, by the laws of nature.”
Hawking touched upon the existence of alien life.”There are forms of intelligent life out there,” he wrote, adding, “we need to be wary of answering back until we have developed a bit further.”
He also argued that traveling back in time can’t be ruled out, artificial intelligence might someday outsmart humans and “within the next hundred years we will be able to travel to anywhere in the Solar System.”
People from different parts of the world have reacted to his revelations in the book on twitter.
Stephen Hawking ‘s final book : There is no God
.
God’s final version : There is no #StephenHawking— arpit ayushman (@arpit_ayushman) October 17, 2018
Allah-o-Akbar, Allah-o-Akbar Kabeera. The entire universe is created by Allah without the help of anyone. Allah has the authority over skies & earth. You even can’t breath without the permission of Allah.#StephenHawking like idiots kept on promoting such rubbish ideas.
— A.R. Qureshi (@AZAD9984) October 17, 2018
I’m looking forward to reading Brief Answers to the Big Questions, perhaps with a whiskey and pen and paper #StephenHawking #inspirational
— Kris Sheather (@kris_sheather) October 17, 2018
#StephenHawking warned that the power to change DNA could lead to the emergence of a genetically-enhanced elite that could eventually dominate or even wipe out the genetic have-nots of a future civilization.
— Business Insider?? (@BiIndia) October 16, 2018
In remarks prepared by Hawking and played at the launch of the book in London on Monday, the scientist also turned his attention to the world he was leaving behind.