London, 2018, March 14, 3:46 am, Hawking sighed for the last time. When the first ray of sunlight gleamed on the face of this great physicist, his head was tilted aside as usual. Under his crooked glasses, the eyes that once could see through everything were dimmed at the end. The corners of his mouth reflected joy, but as long with his life forever, solidified…

Hawking left, he just left. A peaceful line on the wheelchair’s heart rate monitor broke 76 years of legend and tragedy. All we know is that the person who once explained time was taken away by time. The brightest star in the sky of scientists has fallen.  This will be a huge loss for mankind. 

When Stephan Hawking was 21 years old, he had an extremely rare illness called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; this syndrome will gradually paralyze every single organ of the patient until the time they die. Doctors said he could only live for another two years, and he lived for 55 years. Can you imagine yourself sitting on a wheelchair, talking through a voice synchronizer by typing words with only 3 of your fingers moving for the rest of your life?. Most people would have given up a long time ago. But Hawking didn’t. He not only lived, but became one of the greatest Physicists in history. 

Stephan Hawking is the most unique scientist of all time. While everyone was thinking in one direction, he liked to think in the opposite direction. Stephan Hawking’s greatest contribution in science is his work on Black Holes. While every single one of us thinks a black hole should be black, Hawking believed that black holes are capable of radiating energy through the form of light! Imagine, a black hole glowing like a sun and evaporating over time. 

Stephan Hawking’s greatest achievement is not in the world of academics, but his new inspiration for the next generations. Most scientists often ask the question, how does the universe work? Hawking asks the question, why does the universe work? What is the purpose of the universe? If you ask a highschool student, what do you think Physics is? Many of which probably will say, the study of the universe, the study of the laws of nature. But deep in their heart, most people in the world only view Physics as a tool for engineering, or a brain exercise that is only fun to smart people. Stephan Hawking tells us a different story. The nature of Physics has nothing to do with engineering, it doesn’t even have much to do with our universe. What Physics does is Physics states relationships. The relationships between objects and objects, and the relationship between objects and the purpose of the universe itself. Stephan Hawking believed there are two different types of laws of Physics, one kind of law only describes our universe, and the other laws represent the purpose of our universe, which describe what is outside the scope of our cosmos. It is important to distinguish them because one of them tells us only the facts and the others tell us the truth. We live in a changing world with political events happening dramatically, cultures interfering and bringing conflicts, and new technologies coming up everyday. So many changes, so many facts, so many lies, so many uncertainties. So Stephan asks ourselves, among all things that are temporary, where lies the eternity? Among all things that are changing dramatically, what are the things that do not change? And he believes that the truth lies in Physics. The core of Physics is not science but Philosophy. All Physics is, is to try to grasp the unchanging eternal properties of this changing world. Stephan Hawking does not have faith in God, but he does have faith in the nature of mankind and their intelligence which is given by God. Stephan Hawking does not just love Physics, He has faith in Physics. Before death he always reminds us “Don’t always look down at your feet. Look up at the stars”.

Stephan Hawking has gone. But his spirit remains, no matter where he is, we will carry on his mission, his quest for truth. 

From the movie The Theory of Everything Hawking said this at the end, “It is clear that we are just an advanced breed of primates on a minor planet orbiting around a very average star, in the outer suburb of one among a hundred billion galaxies. But, ever since the dawn of civilization people have craved for an understanding of the underlying order of the world. There ought to be something very special about the boundary conditions of the universe. And what can be more special than that there is no boundary? And there should be no boundary to human endeavor. We are all different. However bad life may seem, there is always something you can do, and succeed at. While there is life, there is hope.”