Some of the important declarations of Stephen Hawking from the book, “STEPHEN HAWKING — Quest for a Theory of Everything” by Kitty Ferguson

 

(Page 10-11)

 

In the Cockcroft Lecture Room here, on April 29, 1980, scientists and university dignitaries gathered in steep tiers of seats, facing a two-story wall of chalkboard and slide screen. The title of the lecture was a question: “Is the End in Sight for Theoretical Physics?” and Hawking startled his listeners by announcing that he thought it was. It was typical Hawking audacity to begin this distinguished professorship by predicting the end of his own field. He said he thought there was a good chance the so-called Theory of Everything would be found before the close of the century, leaving little for theoretical physicists like himself to do.

 

(Chapter 2, page 1)

 

“We and everything we know about (and much we do not know) are in the thick of the play. If there is Theory of Everything, we and everything in the universe must be obeying its principles, even while we try to discover what they are”.

 

(2^nd chapter, page 13)

 

Imagine you have never seen our universe. Is there a set of rules so complete that by studying them you could discover exactly what our universe is like? Could you read through those rules in a lifetime? Many physicists believe it would take you much less time than that. They think the rule of book is short and that it contains a set of fairly simple principles, perhaps even just one principle that lies behind everything that has happened, is happening, and ever will happen in our universe. Stephen Hawking says that set of rules—that Theory of Everything—may be within our reach.

 

(Chapter 10, page 160)

 

“if somebody find the Theory of Everything, what then? According to Hawking, doing physics after that would be like mountaineering after Mount Everest has been conquered. However, Hawking has also said that for humanity as a whole it would be only the beginning, because although the a Theory of Everything would tell us how the universe works and why it is the way it is, it won’t tell us why it exist at all.”