No ordinary scientist

With the death of Stephen Hawking, we not only lost an ingenious physicist and cosmologist but also a philosophical thinker for humanity.

I was fortunate to have attended his lecture in Cambridge in 1995. What impressed me was his unbeatable sense of humor despite (or because of?) his serious illness. That has encouraged people. He was also an admonisher and his voice will be missed.

I have read all of his books, even the children’s book he released with his daughter. His talent was in explaining scientifically complicated things to ordinary people in words that they understand. Not every scientist can do that.

I even understood his book, “A Brief History of Time,” and I am far from being familiar with physics and mathematics.

He never believed in life after death. He described the brain as a computer that eventually goes out and then there is nothing, and that you do not need to be afraid of the dark.

He was right, we came out of nowhere and go into nothing, why the fear?

RIP Mr. Hawking, you will be missed.

JUERGEN SCHOEFER, PhD, [email protected]