This is the first celebrity death in many years that I feel genuinely sad about. As a kid, he was one of my main inspirations that led to me becoming a scientist. As an adult, I watched many of his online lectures and read his books, my favorite of course being A Brief History of Time (give it a read, it really is very good!) It was a dream of mine to meet Professor Hawking in person but I guess that'll never happen. I'm happy that he lived to be 76 despite being predicted to not make it past 25 due to his ALS--if that doesn't inspire you to live out your dreams to the absolute fullest then I don't know what will.
I'll end this off with some of my favorite quotes by him:
[quote]The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.[/quote]
[quote]I’m not afraid of death, but I’m in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first.[/quote]
[quote]For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk and we learned to listen. Speech has allowed the communication of ideas, enabling human beings to work together to build the impossible. Mankind’s greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn’t have to be like this. Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future. With the technology at our disposal, the possibilities are unbounded. All we need to do is make sure we keep talking.[/quote]
[quote]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.[/quote]
RIP
