Top 532 Quotes & Sayings by Stephen Hawking - Page 3

My work and my family are very important to me.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm as famous for my wheelchair and disabilities as I am for my discoveries.

There is no physical law precluding particles from being organised in ways that perform even more advanced computations than the arrangements of particles in human brains.

Using e-mail, I can communicate with scientists all over the world.

Before I lost my voice, it was slurred, so only those close to me could understand, but with the computer voice, I found I could give popular lectures. I enjoy communicating science. It is important that the public understands basic science, if they are not to leave vital decisions to others.

'The Simpsons' appearances were great fun. But I don't take them too seriously. I think 'The Simpsons' have treated my disability responsibly.

I believe in universal health care. And I am not afraid to say so.

I hope I have helped to raise the profile of science and to show that physics is not a mystery but can be understood by ordinary people.

Earth might one day soon resemble the planet Venus.

I grew up thinking that a research scientist was a natural thing to be.

I don't want to write an autobiography because I would become public property with no privacy left.

If we do discover a complete theory, it should be in time understandable in broad principle by everyone. Then we shall all, philosophers, scientists, and just ordinary people be able to take part in the discussion of why we and the universe exist.

My first popular book, 'A Brief History of Time,' aroused a great deal of interest, but many found it difficult to understand.

Science is increasingly answering questions that used to be the province of religion.

I think those who have a terminal illness and are in great pain should have the right to choose to end their own life, and those that help them should be free from prosecution.

Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in.

When we understand string theory, we will know how the universe began. It won't have much effect on how we live, but it is important to understand where we come from and what we can expect to find as we explore.

I think the human race doesn't have a future if it doesn't go into space.

I am in touch with a company that hopes to replicate my voice. However, they are not replicating my original voice - if they did that, I would sound like a man in his 20s, which would be very strange! They are actually trying to replicate the synthesizer that sits on my wheelchair.

Time can behave like another direction in space under extreme conditions.

Maybe I don't have the most common kind of motor neuron disease, which usually kills in two or three years.

We must develop as quickly as possible technologies that make possible a direct connection between brain and computer, so that artificial brains contribute to human intelligence rather than opposing it.

The cyclic universe theory predicts no gravitational waves from the early universe.

The human race may be the only intelligent beings in the galaxy.

My three children have brought me great joy.

The fastest manned vehicle in history was Apollo 10. It reached 25,000 mph.

I believe everyone should have a broad picture of how the universe operates and our place in it. It is a basic human desire. And it also puts our worries in perspective.

A zero-gravity flight is a first step toward space travel.

Why are we here? Where do we come from? Traditionally, these are questions for philosophy, but philosophy is dead.

Throughout history, people have studied pure science from a desire to understand the universe rather than practical applications for commercial gain. But their discoveries later turned out to have great practical benefits.

I don't have much positive to say about motor neurone disease. But it taught me not to pity myself because others were worse off, and to get on with what I could still do.

Even if there is only one possible unified theory, it is just a set of rules and equations. What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?

I don't have much positive to say about motor neuron disease, but it taught me not to pity myself because others were worse off, and to get on with what I still could do. I'm happier now than before I developed the condition.

The universe is governed by science. But science tells us that we can't solve the equations, directly in the abstract.

One cannot really argue with a mathematical theorem.

Most people don't have time to master the very mathematical details of theoretical physics.

Among physicists, I'm respected I hope.

Observations indicate that the universe is expanding at an ever increasing rate. It will expand forever, getting emptier and darker.

It now appears that the way the universe began can indeed be determined, using imaginary time.

All my adult life people have been helping me.

I think the discovery of supersymmetric partners for the known particles would revolutionize our understanding of the universe.

Computers double their performance every month.

I was born on January 8, 1942, exactly three hundred years after the death of Galileo. I estimate, however, that about two hundred thousand other babies were also born that day. I don't know whether any of them was later interested in astronomy.

Only black holes of very low mass would emit a significant amount of radiation.

There is a real danger that computers will develop intelligence and take over. We urgently need to develop direct connections to the brain so that computers can add to human intelligence rather than be in opposition.

I had not expected 'A Brief History of Time' to be a best seller.

Philosophers have not kept up with modern developments in science. Particularly physics.

The voice I use is a very old hardware speech synthesizer made in 1986. I keep it because I have not heard a voice I like better and because I have identified with it.

Cosmology is a rapidly advancing field.

It's a pity that nobody has found an exploding black hole. If they had, I would have won a Nobel prize.

There are no black holes in the sense of regimes from which light can't escape to infinity.

God not only plays dice, but also sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.

Obviously, because of my disability, I need assistance. But I have always tried to overcome the limitations of my condition and lead as full a life as possible. I have traveled the world, from the Antarctic to zero gravity.

You can't regulate every lab in the world.

As Irving Good realised in 1965, machines with superhuman intelligence could repeatedly improve their design even further, triggering what Vernor Vinge called a 'singularity.'

Some scientists think it may be possible to capture a wormhole and enlarge it many trillions of times to make it big enough for a human or even a spaceship to enter.

We lived in a tall, narrow Victorian house, which my parents had bought very cheaply during the war, when everyone thought London was going to be bombed flat. In fact, a V-2 rocket landed a few houses away from ours. I was away with my mother and sister at the time, but my father was in the house.

M-theory is the unified theory Einstein was hoping to find.

Theology is unnecessary.

For years, my early work with Roger Penrose seemed to be a disaster for science. It showed that the universe must have begun with a singularity, if Einstein's general theory of relativity is correct. That appeared to indicate that science could not predict how the universe would begin.