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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
STEPHEN HAWKING
A Life in Science
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
Other books by Michael White include:
Acid Tongues and Tranquil Dreamers: Tales of Bitter Rivalry that Fueled the Advancement of Science and Technology
Darwin: A Life in Science (with John Gribbin)
Einstein: A Life in Science (with John Gribbin)
Isaac Newton: The Last Sorcerer
Leonardo: The First Scientist
Life Out There: The Truth of—and Search for—Extraterrestrial Life
The Pope and the Heretic: A True Story of Courage and Murder at the Hands of the Inquisition
Weird Science: An Expert Explains Ghosts, Voodoo, the UFO Conspiracy, and Other Paranormal Phenomena
Thompson Twin: An 80’s Memoir
Tolkein: A Biography
Other books by John Gribbin include:
Almost Everyone’s Guide to Science
The Birth of Time: How Astronomers Measured the Age of the Universe
A Brief History of Science
The Case of the Missing Neutrinos: And Other Curious Phenomena of the Universe
Companion to the Cosmos
Empire of the Sun: Planets and Moons of the Solar System (with Simon Goodwin)
Eyewitness: Time & Space (with Mary Gribbin)
Fire on Earth: Doomsday, Dinosaurs, and Humankind (with Mary Gribbin)
Hyperspace: The Universe and Its Mysteries
In Search of Schrödinger’s Cat: Quantum Physics and Reality
In Search of the Big Bang: The Life and Death of the Universe
In Search of the Double Helix
In Search of the Edge of Time: Black Holes, White Holes, Wormholes
In the Beginning: The Birth of the Living Universe
Origins: Our Place in Hubble’s Universe (with Simon Goodwin)
Q Is for Quantum: An Encyclopedia of Particle Physics
Richard Feynman: A Life in Science (with Mary Gribbin)
Schrödinger’s Kittens and the Search for Reality: Solving the Quantum Mysteries
The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Everything
Stardust: Supernovae and Life: The Cosmic Connection (with Mary Gribbin)
XTL: Extraterrestrial Life and How to Find It (with Simon Goodwin)
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
STEPHEN HAWKING
A Life in Science
New Updated Edition
Michael White and
John Gribbin
The Joseph Henry Press
Washington, D.C.
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
Joseph Henry Press
2101 Constitution Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20418
The Joseph Henry Press, an imprint of the National Academy Press, was created with the goal of making books on science, technology, and health more widely available to professionals and the public. Joseph Henry was one of the founders of the National Academy of Sciences and a leader in early American science.
Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this volume are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Academy of Sciences or its affiliated institutions.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
White, Michael, 1959-
Stephen Hawking : a life in science / Michael White and John Gribbin.— New updated ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-309-08410-5 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Hawking, S. W. (Stephen W.) 2. Astrophysics. 3. Physicists—Great Britain—Biography. I. Gribbin, John R. II. Title.
QC16.H33 W45 2002
530'.092—dc21
2002011961
Copyright 1992, 1998, 2002 by Michael White and John Gribbin. All rights reserved.
The first edition of this work was published by Viking in 1992.
Extracts from A Brief History of Time, copyright Stephen Hawking, 1988, reprinted by permission of Writers House, Inc., New York.
Printed in the United States of America.
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
Contents
Preface
vii
Acknowledgments
xi
1.
The Day Galileo Died
1
2.
Classical Cosmology
21
3.
Going Up
40
4.
Doctors and Doctorates
56
5.
From Black Holes to the Big Bang
74
6.
Marriage and Fellowship
87
7.
Singular Solutions
104
8.
The Breakthrough Years
117
9.
When Black Holes Explode
135
10.
The Foothills of Fame
152
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
11.
Back to the Beginning
175
12.
Science Celebrity
187
13.
When the Universe Has Babies
207
14.
A Brief History of Time
220
15.
The End of Physics?
252
16.
Hollywood, Fame, and Fortune
265
17.
A Brief History of Time Travel
292
18.
Stephen Hawking: Superstar
304
Notes
322
About the Authors
329
Index
331
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
Preface
When Stephen Hawking was involved in a minor road accident in Cambridge city center early in 1991, within twelve hours American TV networks were on the phone to his publisher, Bantam, for a low-down on the story. The fact that he suffered only minor injuries and was back at his desk within days was irrelevant. But then anything about Stephen Hawking is newsworthy. This would never have happened to any other scientist in the world. Apart from the fact that physicists are seen as somehow different from other human beings, existing outside the normal patterns of human life, there is no other scientist alive as famous as Stephen Hawking.
But Stephen Hawking is no ordinary scientist. His book A Brief History of Time has notched up worldwide sales in the millions— publishing statistics usually associated with the likes of Jeffrey Archer and Stephen King. What is even more astonishing is that Hawking’s book deals with a subject so far removed from normal bedtime reading that the prospect of tackling such a text would send the average person into a paroxysm of inadequacy. Yet, as the world knows, Professor Hawking’s book is a massive hit and has
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
made his name around the world. Somehow he has managed to circumvent prejudice and to communicate his esoteric theories directly to the lay reader.
However, Stephen Hawking’s story does not begin or end with A Brief History of Time. First and foremost, he is a very fine scientist. Indeed, he was already established at the cutting edge of theoretical physics long before the general public was even aware of his existence. His career as a scientist began over thirty years ago when he embarked on cosmological research at Cambridge University.
During those thirty years, he has perhaps done more than anyone to push back the boundaries of our understanding of the Universe. His theoretical work on black holes and his progress in advancing our understanding of the origin and nature of the Universe have been groundbreaking and often revolutionary.
As his career has soared, he has led a domestic life as alien to most people as his work is esoteric. At the age of twenty-one Hawking discovered that he had the wasting disease ALS, also called motor neuron disease, and he has spent much of his life confined to a wheelchair. However, he simply has not allowed his illness to hinder his scientific development. In fact, many would argue that his liberation from the routine chores of life has enabled him to make greater progress than if he were able bodied. He has achieved global fame as a science popularizer with his multimillion-selling book, and more recently a BBC television series, Stephen Hawking’s Universe, while maintaining a high-powered career as a physicist.
Stephen Hawking does not like to dwell too much on his disabilities, and even less on his personal life. He would rather people thought of him as a scientist first, popular science writer second, and, in all the ways that matter, a normal human being with the same desires, drives, dreams, and ambitions as the next person. In this book we have tried our best to respect his wishes and have endeavored to paint a picture of a man with talents in abundance,
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
but nonetheless a man like any other.
In attempting to describe Professor Hawking’s work as well as the life of the man behind the science, we hope to enable the reader to see both from different perspectives. Although there are inevitable overlaps in the story, we hope this will help to place the science within the human context—indeed, to show that, for Stephen Hawking, science and life are inextricably linked.
Michael White, Perth
John Gribbin, Lewes
September 2002
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank a number of people who, for one reason or another, helped to make this book happen: Mark Barty-King, Dr. Robert Berman, Maureen Berman, Roberta Bernstein, staff at the Cambridge County Library, Professor Brandon Carter, Marcus Chown, Michael Church, Virgil Clarke, Sami Cohen, Dr. Kevin Davies, Professor Paul Davies, Sue Davies, Fischer Dilke, Norman Dix, Dr. Fay Dowker, Professor George Efstathiou, Professor George Ellis, Peter Guzzardi, Professor Edward Harrison, Professor Stephen Hawking, David Hickman, Chris Holifield, Professor Maurice Jacob, Dr. David Lindley, Shirley MacLaine, Dr. John McClenahan, Ravi Mirchandani, Dr. Simon Mitton, Dr. Joseph Needham, Professor Don Page, Murray Pollinger, Colonel Geoffrey Pryke OBE, Professor Abdus Salam, Professor David Schramm, Professor Dennis Sciama, Lydia Sciama, Professor Paul Steinhardt, Rodney Tibbs, Professor Michael Turner, Dr. Tanmay Vachaspati, Professor Alex Vilenkin, Lisa Whitaker, and Nigel Wood-Smith.
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Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science
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