Google Doodle Honors Stephen Hawking's 80th Birthday (google.com) 30
Slashdot reader DevNull127 writes: Google marked what would've been Stephen Hawking's 80th birthday with a very special Doodle — an animated video in which the voice of Stephen Hawking speaks again, generated and used with the approval of the Hawking estate.
"My expectations were reduced to zero at 21. Everything since then has been a bonus," Hawking says in the video. "Although I cannot move and I have to speak through a computer, in my mind I am free. I have spent my life travelling across the universe, inside my mind."
In the video tribute, Stephen Hawking passes near a black hole on a model timeline of the universe. "We are very very small," he says. "But we are profoundly capable of very very big things.
"There should be no boundaries to human endeavor. However bad life may seem. While there is life, there is hope. Be brave, be curious, be determined, overcome the odds. It can be done."
"From colliding black holes to the Big Bang, his theories on the origins and mechanics of the universe revolutionized modern physics," explains the Google Doodles page, "while his best-selling books made the field widely accessible to millions of readers worldwide."
And Google's Arts and Culture blog shares a longer look at Stephen Hawking's life, including a 1979 photo of young Hawking at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University. "Because of Stephen Hawking's work, the radiation emitted by black holes is now called Hawking Radiation," the biography says at one point, also remembering Hawking's best-selling book A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes.
But they also share some more personal memories: In 1990, with lifelong friend, the physicist Kip Thorne, Stephen approached the controversial notion of whether time travel is allowed by the laws of physics. To explore this hypothesis Stephen planned a party for time travellers. He wrote invitations, set a date, time and venue and provided precise GPS coordinates.
Stephen did not send out the invitations until after the party date was over. That way, only those who could genuinely travel back in time would know of it and be able to attend.
On the due day Stephen sat politely and waited. But no-one came. And that was the point. "I have experimental evidence that time travel is not possible", he said afterwards. And the champagne went back on ice....
The biography closes with this quote from Stephen Hawking. "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.
"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."
"My expectations were reduced to zero at 21. Everything since then has been a bonus," Hawking says in the video. "Although I cannot move and I have to speak through a computer, in my mind I am free. I have spent my life travelling across the universe, inside my mind."
In the video tribute, Stephen Hawking passes near a black hole on a model timeline of the universe. "We are very very small," he says. "But we are profoundly capable of very very big things.
"There should be no boundaries to human endeavor. However bad life may seem. While there is life, there is hope. Be brave, be curious, be determined, overcome the odds. It can be done."
"From colliding black holes to the Big Bang, his theories on the origins and mechanics of the universe revolutionized modern physics," explains the Google Doodles page, "while his best-selling books made the field widely accessible to millions of readers worldwide."
And Google's Arts and Culture blog shares a longer look at Stephen Hawking's life, including a 1979 photo of young Hawking at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University. "Because of Stephen Hawking's work, the radiation emitted by black holes is now called Hawking Radiation," the biography says at one point, also remembering Hawking's best-selling book A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes.
But they also share some more personal memories: In 1990, with lifelong friend, the physicist Kip Thorne, Stephen approached the controversial notion of whether time travel is allowed by the laws of physics. To explore this hypothesis Stephen planned a party for time travellers. He wrote invitations, set a date, time and venue and provided precise GPS coordinates.
Stephen did not send out the invitations until after the party date was over. That way, only those who could genuinely travel back in time would know of it and be able to attend.
On the due day Stephen sat politely and waited. But no-one came. And that was the point. "I have experimental evidence that time travel is not possible", he said afterwards. And the champagne went back on ice....
The biography closes with this quote from Stephen Hawking. "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.
"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."
Damn (Score:4)
This damn near made me cry.
If I was 1/100th as smart as Stephen Hawking was, I'd be about 100 times smarter than I am right now. :(
Re: (Score:2)
This damn near made me cry.
If I was 1/100th as smart as Stephen Hawking was, I'd be about 100 times smarter than I am right now. :(
But it makes you wonder what would have happened if he had something that affected him earlier than 21, before he had completed most of his education, like in grades 1-12. Would the education system have been good enough for him so he could have still shined as brightly or would he have fallen through the cracks? There are many kids, including gifted kids, with problems, illnesses, bad home lives, etc... who suffer from inadequate schools and/or school funding or incorrect thinking that kids like them do
Time Travel is possible (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
We know it can be changed, or rather that it is relative depending on your frame of reference.
Because the speed of light is fixed, one object moving faster than another will also advance through time slightly quicker too. It's been demonstrated with atomic clocks. Astronauts who spend significant amounts of time in space (I think the record is held by a Russian) gain a little on the rest of us, i.e. they age slightly more slowly from our perspective. We are only talking fractions of a second, but it's happe
Re: (Score:2)
When most people ask "Is time travel possible?" they usually mean into the past.
Not a black hole (Score:2)
In the video tribute, Stephen Hawking passes through a black hole. "We are very very small," he says. "But we are profoundly capable of very very big things.
That's not a black hole he passes through, it's a model timeline of the universe. Those green lines represent its expansion/contraction. The only black hole he encounters he doesn't pass through.
google has no nerd cred (Score:2)
This is just an ad for Google. But Google lost its nerd cred a long time ago.
Stephen Hawking was an amazing person and deserves to be celebrated.
Google being evil again (Score:2)
But not in this way, by stealing his voice and putting words in Hawking's mouth for their financial gain. How dare you Google, you horrible fuckers. Absolutely disgusting.
Let the dead stay dead and give them their well-earned rest.
Re: google has no nerd cred (Score:2)
One of... (Score:2)
One of the usual suspects. Always "honoring" the same celebrities. I liked it better when they honored Lotfi Zadeh.
Re: (Score:3)
He's too fuzzy.
Re: (Score:2)
Always "honoring" the same celebrities.
That seems unfair. Check for yourself here [google.com]. I'd never heard of María Grever (Mexican composer), Zitkala-Sa (Native American writer), Anne McLaren (British biologist) or María de los Ángeles Alvariño González (Spanish oceanographer).
Re: (Score:2)
Sorry, forgot to include woke heroes among "celebrities."
Re: (Score:2)
Sorry the time travellers couldn't attend (Score:2)
everything wrong with "scientists" (Score:2)
In 1990, with lifelong friend, the physicist Kip Thorne, Stephen approached the controversial notion of whether time travel is allowed by the laws of physics. To explore this hypothesis Stephen planned a party for time travellers. He wrote invitations, set a date, time and venue and provided precise GPS coordinates.
Stephen did not send out the invitations until after the party date was over. That way, only those who could genuinely travel back in time would know of it and be able to attend.
On the due day Stephen sat politely and waited. But no-one came. And that was the point. "I have experimental evidence that time travel is not possible", he said afterwards. And the champagne went back on ice....
assumption: thinking that anyone in the future gives a shit to attend in the first place.
MC Hawking (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Is that :
a) Good
b) Bad
c) Irrelevant
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
Good! The Israeli gov't are Putin-like land-thieves, inventing silly excuses to take land. [reddit.com]
8-bit look (Score:2)
The video has an 8-bit-graphics look. Everything old becomes "new" again if you wait long enough. Windows 12 perhaps will look like Visual Basic for DOS, a character-based GUI (although typically by the time MS finishes, it will be out of style again.)
Re: (Score:2)
That will come automatically when they have finished implementing WSTOS - Windows Subsystem for TempleOS.
Dead men tell no something something (Score:2)
I just think it is horribly tacky. When someone dies we loose their voice, so it should be here. This is macabre.
Re: (Score:2)
Impy's Theory of Time Travel Paradoxes (Score:2)
Impy's Theory of Time Travel Paradoxes
If time travel is possible, people will keep coming back in time and changing history, until someone screws something up so badly time travel never gets invented.
Re: (Score:2)
Note this is not limited to massive destruction or unrecoverable societal collapse, but could include subtle influences where everything continues apace.
Re: (Score:2)
The corollary: We are in that world already.
A Very Brave Man (Score:3)
How does one keep a sense of humor (like his frequent appearances on "The Big Bang Theory"), given a most unhappy medical condition like that.
Braver than I, no question.