Page 3 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper March/April 2018 Edition

Life & Death of Dr. Stephen Hawking 3

Man Out Of Time: Life

and Death of Dr. Stephen
Hawking

By Kal Korff
Host of Kal’s Korner
on
XZBN

himself, had managed to break through to the Gehrig’s disease, named in honor of the famed
The alert came to my iPhone from the public, he was a revered worldwide celebrity. American Yankee’s baseball player who was
Center for Inquiry in Pakistan, of all His book, A Brief History Of Time, which struck down in the prime of his life from it.
places, courtesy of my friend attempted to explain the universe he was trying Initially given by medical professionals
to unravel for humanity to comprehend, sold as little as three years to live, he proved his
Muhammad Idrees. The news he
millions of copies and was even made into a ‘expert’ doctors wrong, finally passing away at
posted on his social media page was
short movie which captivated still more millions age 76 after crafting a career that is truly the
tragic, yet historic. Dr. Stephen of people around the world. stuff legends are made of. Hawking outlived
Hawking, the famed Theoretical their predictions for his lifespan by 52 years.
Physicist, had died at the age of 76. A Star Is Born Even his abilities to speak normally were
“Rest in peace Stephen Hawking, no destroyed by his condition. To communicate, he
words to explain your great work Born on October 8, 1942 in Oxford, England, was fitted with a computer and flat panel screen
his parents moved during World War II from that was programmed with thousands of canned
you’ve done for humanity,” Idrees
Great Britain’s capital city of London because it phrases and would generate robotic sounding
wrote, and he is right. was being regularly bombed by Adolf Hitler’s synthetic speech. The original default voice used
Nazi Germany. His father was an expert in in Apple’s original Macintosh computer released
Being a member of the Center for Inquiry in biology, science was ‘the norm’ in the Hawking in 1984 for text-to-speech synthesis is
Pakistan, is especially risky. Pakistan is family, to the point that even when they all sat essentially the same computerized voice that
arguably a failed nation, steeped in religious down together to have their meals and eat, they Hawking used and became famous for. It has
superstition and the violence, hatred and spent much of their time reading whatever appeared in different productions over decades,
intolerance that typically accompanies such interested them versus talking to each other. including being used by the famed alternative
primitive stuck in a loop mentality. Its As he grew up, young Stephen Hawking rock band Pink Floyd in their smash hit song,
government and officials openly support found normal school curriculum boring, he aced Keep Talking. Its famous line, “For millions of
Islamic militant terrorism. I have lost fellow his subjects very easily. Yet like other geniuses years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then
journalist friends such as Imran Zaki, to before him, he began to develop a myopic focus something happened. We learned to talk.”
terrorists there, murdered because they dared to and passion only for the things he liked. He Hawking certainly also kept talking, kept
speak the truth, advocated a secular, tolerant could care less about subjects he wasn’t calculating, and would make several historic
society and renounced violence. interested in, yet became a top expert in what scientific breakthroughs. He discovered what
To be in the middle of this insanity, were his passions. This was also true of Einstein, would later be called Hawking Radiation, which
advocating critical thinking and secular who was dismissed at one point by his teachers is defined as being essentially blackbody
humanism, runs the very real risk of death in as being mentally insufficient for higher radiation that exists and is released in black
Pakistan. Yet here Idrees was, telling the truth as education. A rebellious youth, if not a ‘wild holes. It is caused by various quantum physics
he always does, about a scientific giant who had man’ during his early university years, Hawking effects near the event horizon of a black
now just died, whereas most Pakistanis could was known as a very talented man who was hole.This radiation is caused by a black hole
care less and will remain clueless about just intellectually gifted, yet rebelled against the capturing one of a particle-antiparticle pair
how great a mind Dr. Stephen Hawking status quo. Then, his physical world began to which are created spontaneously near the event
possessed. crash around him. horizon.
To be fair, even in the far more tolerant (Continued on Page 4)
and secular west, most people also cannot get Fatal Diagnosis
their minds around what Hawking routinely did For the Very Best of
anymore than they can understand Dr. Albert
At the age of just 21, Hawking was diagnosed Paranormal and Parapsychology
Einstein’s famous theory of relativity. For the
with a terminal neuronic disease that would end Real News, With Real People
circles of academia and pure science that was
up paralyzing every part of his body except for a 24 / 7 / 365
Hawking’s mental playground of infinite
small part of his right cheekbone, leaving him
inquiry was a rarified one, understood by few. Listen To
wheelchair bound for most of his years.
Yet Hawking, arguably the greatest The ‘X’ Zone Broadcast Network
Commonly known as Amyotrophic Lateral
mind in theoretical physics since Einstein www.xzbn.net
Sclerosis (ALS), its more popular name is Lou