Written by Madhav Bahl, a grade 8 student

It is said that when you come with a purpose nothing can stop you from dying before you complete it. We can say the same for Stephen Hawking, who changed the world.

Stephen Hawking was a brilliant physicist, cosmologist (cosmology is a branch of astronomy that studies the studies of origins of the universe), and author who did groundbreaking work in physics – his work with black holes and relativity is well known. His books helped to make science more accessible and understandable to everyone. 

At age 21, when he was studying cosmology at the University of Cambridge, he was diagnosed with a horrific disease called Motor Neurone Disease This disease is so deadly that after being diagnosed a patient usually does not live more than 14 months. However, Stephen Hawking fought the illnesses for almost 50 years and finally passed away on March 14, 2018, at the age of 76.

He will forever be known as one of the greatest scientists the world has seen.

Where did he study?

He studied at St Alban’s School Hertfordshire and went to 3 colleges. The 3 colleges are Trinity Hall Cambridge, University of Cambridge, and University of Oxford

His career – and his work with black holes

Even after being in a wheelchair since he was 20 years old he never gave up, and after completing his education he started researching black holes. He found out that black holes are not completely black and then discovered the rules of black hole mechanics. His theory “Exploding black holes” made us familiar with both relativity theory and quantum mechanics. He also worked with space-time singularities. He found out that gravitation produces singularities and wrote a world-famous book called A Brief History of Time- From the Big Bang to Black Hole. He said that his one career goal was to understand everything in the universe, a goal embedded in us that we will continue to strive for.

Some more about him

He did not believe in God and said that heaven was like a fairy story. He was humble and intelligent at another level and did not like titles at all and that is why he also rejected his knighthood.

The saddest part of the life of Stephen Hawking was that he failed to win a Noble Prize as all his ideas and inventions were said to have no proof according to the Noble committee. Stephen Hawking was married twice once to Jane hawking who had an affair and was divorced and Elaine Mason who was also divorced. Stephen Hawking like Abraham Lincoln had a sad and a life full of failures but what mattered most after that was how they bounced back from their failures and became successful and they did it in style.  

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