We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet.
Please join me in applauding the ESA - European Space Agency’s historic efforts with the Rosetta Mission and landing a spacecraft on rotating comet. It may seem like a work of fiction, but it is very real, very impressive, and will help us to further uncover the mysteries surrounding the formation of the solar system. They made a beautiful short film using an imaginary landscape to illustrate today’s historic feat.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote celebrates the achievements of the European Space Agency in space exploration and its impact on our understanding of the solar system.
In this quote, Stephen Hawking expresses admiration for the European Space Agency's Rosetta Mission, which successfully landed a spacecraft on a comet. He emphasizes the extraordinary nature of this accomplishment, which may seem fictional but is a reality that has significant implications for our knowledge of the formation of the solar system. Through this mission, scientists hope to unravel complex mysteries about our celestial neighborhood, illustrating the intersection of human creativity and scientific exploration.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a scientific seminar on space exploration, this quote can inspire discussions about contemporary missions.
More from Stephen Hawking
All quotes →I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.
It surprises me how disinterested we are today about things like physics, space, the universe and philosophy of our existence, our purpose, our final destination. Its a crazy world out there. Be curious.
I was not a good student. I did not spend much time at college; I was too busy enjoying myself.
The world has changed far more in the past 100 years than in any other century in history. The reason is not political or economic but technological-technologies that flowed directly from advances in basic science. Clearly, no scientist better represents those advances than Albert Einstein: TIME's Person of the Century.
In my opinion, there is no aspect of reality beyond the reach of the human mind.
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We have the resources to build room for a trillion humans in this solar system, and when we have a trillion humans, we'll have a thousand Einsteins and a thousand Mozarts. It will be a way more interesting place to live.
I did not come to NASA to make history.
In the good old days physicists repeated each other's experiments, just to be sure. Today they stick to FORTRAN, so that they can share each other's programs, bugs included.
During the Middle Ages there were all kinds of crazy ideas, such as that a piece of rhinoceros horn would increase potency. Then a method was discovered for separating the ideas - which was to try one to see if it worked, and if it didn't work, to eliminate it. This method became organized, of course, into science.
But when I wasn't working, I was usually at a window looking down at Earth.
In any finite region of space, matter can only arrange itself in a finite number of configurations, just as a deck of cards can be arranged in only finitely many different orders. If you shuffle the deck infinitely many times, the card orderings must necessarily repeat.