Hawking says belief in any event after death is simply wishful thinking.
Stephen Hawking, well-known physicist and atheist, dismissed the idea of God a few months prior to his death.[/tweetit] In his latest book, Brief Answers to the Big Questions, published posthumously, he dismisses the idea of heaven as a kind of fairy story for people who are afraid of dark spaces. He died in March. Hawking was 76 years of age at the time of his death.
“There Is No God” Stephen Hawking Says in His Final Book ‘Brief Answers to the Big Questions'[/tweetthis]
In his book, Hawking wrote that God does not exist. He emphatically said the universe is directed by no one and by extension there is no afterlife or heaven as well. Belief in any event after death is simply wishful thinking. No reliable evidence supports any event post death, and the whole idea is totally at odds with scientific thinking. When people die, they return to the dust from where they actually came. The only way, he said, to live on after death is to pass genes on to children.
Hawking was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis or ALS in 1962 and doctors informed him he will live for a maximum of two years. He was 21 years old at that time. The physicist not only coasted those two years, but he also lived for 55 years thereafter. The physicist praised his family, friends, and colleagues for his survival.
Hawking had a great number of thoughts concerning the afterlife. He had compared the human brain to computers and said similar to a broken computer, having something after death is simply a fairy tale. When it came to AI, Hawking was more circumspect. He said it is impossible that humans are the only intelligent life-form in the universe. He said humans need to be cautious before initiating contact with other species. The latter should be contacted after we develop our technologies a little further than we have now.
Brief answers to the big questions… Everyone must read it, to change your life pic.twitter.com/Tpi8Fmv8qO
— Ravan Maharaj (@Ravan9951) October 18, 2018
Thr is No God. We suffer from hallucinations disorder of psychology. https://t.co/qm9hvobZ1b
— kunal govind kapure (@KunalKapure) October 18, 2018
Hawking had predicted humans will be able to travel anywhere within the solar system within the coming 100 years. He also did not dismiss any possibility of travel through time.
Hawking's beliefs will convince the scientific minded but may not have much impact on religious people. Reason does not always triumph over emotion. His last book is not a treatise against the existence of God. The text is his own opinion and proves that Hawking was an atheist until his last breath.