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CERN file
Famed physicist Stephen Hawking visits the Large Hadron Collider's underground tunnel in 2006. He bet against the discovery of the Higgs boson but is now willing to pay up.
When it comes to betting on cosmic outcomes like the discovery of the Higgs boson, British physicist Stephen Hawking is a three-time loser. But there's a good reason for that.
Hawking's latest loss was to Gordon Kane, a theoretical physicist at the University of Michigan who worked out some of the ways that the Higgs boson could be detected in a particle-smasher like the Large Hadron Collider. About 10 years ago, Kane was discussing some of the issues while he and Hawking were together at a physics conference.
"Stephen interrupted, and said he would like to bet me that there was no Higgs boson," Kane recalled today. It took a while to work out the conditions of the $100 bet, and at one point things looked so dim for the search that Kane sent Hawking a check, according to The Detroit News.
But this week, when researchers at the LHC announced that a subatomic particle matching the Higgs boson's general description had been discovered, it was Hawking's turn to concede the bet. "It seems I have just lost $100," he told the BBC's Pallab Ghosh.
Waiting for the check
Kane told me he's heard from several third parties that Hawking is acknowledging his loss, but said Hawking himself "hasn't sent me anything yet." He figures that Hawking will eventually make good on the gambling debt.
"The important thing is the discovery of the Higgs," Kane said. "But it's fun to win a bet from Stephen, and I'm guessing he doesn't mind losing a little money."
This isn't the first time Hawking has lost a small-stakes, high-profile bet on a scientific proposition.
Back in 1975, he bet Caltech physicist Kip Thorne that there was no black hole at the center of the X-ray source known as Cygnus X-1. By 1998, he conceded that the black hole was there, and got Thorne a year's subscription to Penthouse magazine as a payoff.
In 1997, Thorne and Hawking bet Caltech's John Preskill that information is completely lost when something falls into a black hole. But in 2004, Hawking changed his mind and said that information could conceivably leak out of a black hole. Hawking paid up by sending Preskill the repository of information he requested: a baseball encyclopedia. At last report, Thorne had not yet conceded.
There's another wager still pending: Hawking is betting that primordial gravitational waves will be detected, resulting in the confirmation of inflationary big-bang theory. The Perimeter Institute's Neil Turok, a proponent of the cyclic model of cosmic origins, is betting against him.
"If these gravitational waves are seen, they will instantly disprove our model," Turok told Cambridge professor Alan Macfarlane. The terms of the bet, however, are still under negotiation.
0-for-3 record
So, as far as we know, Hawking is 0-for-3, with one bet still up in the air. That led the BBC's Ghosh to joke today in a Twitter update that "research effort could be saved if we knew what other bets Prof. Hawking has placed and assume he'll lose." The only bet that I'm sure Hawking has won is the poker hand he played on "Star Trek: The Next Generation." And that was written into the script.
The opening scene from an episode of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" in which Data plays poker with Stephen Hawking, Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein.
Is Hawking really that bad at anticipating future developments in physics? Not really. The guy just bets with his heart, not with his head.
In the case of Cygnus X-1, for instance, he was actually glad to lose the wager. "This was a form of insurance policy for me," he explained in "A Brief History of Time," his bestselling book. "I have done a lot of work on black holes, and it would all be wasted if it turned out that black holes do not exist. But in that case, I would have the consolation of winning my bet."
The bet about the fate of information in black holes was a true cosmic conundrum, and Hawking decided to go along with the more conservative of the two alternatives, even if it meant buying an encyclopedia for Preskill. If Hawking stuck to his guns, he would have to maintain that the information in black holes disappeared into other universes.
"I'm sorry to disappoint science fiction fans, but if information is preserved, there is no possibility of using black holes to travel to other universes," he said in 2004. "If you jump into a black hole, your mass energy will be returned to our universe, but in a mangled form, which contains the information about what you were like, but in an unrecognizable state."
Hoping for the unexpected
As for the Higgs boson, Hawking was hoping that there'd be a less orthodox and more elegant mechanism to explain how it is that some particles have mass while others don't. Finding the Standard Model Higgs boson, and nothing else, would be a disappointing outcome — as fellow physicist Stephen Wolfram pointed out in a blog posting today. So once again, Hawking was betting with his heart.
"If the decay and other interactions of this particle are as we expect, that will be strong evidence for the so-called Standard Model of particle physics, the theory that explains all our experiments so far," Hawking said. "This is an important result, and should earn Peter Higgs the Nobel Prize. But it is a pity, in a way, because the great advances in physics have come from experiments that gave results we didn't expect."
If it turns out that the particle revealed this week is a non-Standard Model Higgs boson, Hawking might still be able to hang onto his $100, and the cosmos will get that much more mysterious. But in any case, Kane is moving on to the next big thing: supersymmetry, the idea that every one of the subatomic particles we've detected to date has a weird twin we haven't yet been able to see. Such a concept could explain the nature of dark matter, which accounts for far more of the universe than the ordinary matter we see around us.
As strange as it sounds, Kane thinks it's possible to find evidence of supersymmetry — and he's willing to put his money where his mouth is.
"I'd love to have bets on supersymmetry," he told me, "but no one will take them."
Update for 2:30 p.m. ET July 6: Kane told me that it was premature to say what he'd spend the $100 on, but in a Reuters report, he said that "all funds go toward research." He also said that winning the bet was a very nice frosting on the cake" for this week's boson discovery.
Reuters also quotes Scottish theorist Peter Higgs, one of the physicists who came up with the idea behind the field and the particle that now bears his name, as saying that he was tipped off about the discovery the night before Wednesday's announcement, during a champagne dinner with CERN researchers. On the flight home from the event, fellow physicist Alan Walker offered Higgs a glass of Prosecco sparkling wine — but Walker told Reuters that Higgs said, "I'd rather have a beer."
More on the Higgs hoopla:
- The lighter side of the Higgs boson
- Higgs boson explained in (more than) a minute
- Milestone in Higgs quest: Scientists find new particle
- The Higgs boson made simple
- Cartoons visualize the Higgs boson
Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Leave a Comment:
History will now show that some of the great physicist minds of today were gamblers with Stephen Hawking possibly loosing the most assets ....
But it is gambling , that bets or spends so much currency to hopefully win a discovery such as the "Higgs boson" ....
A gamble that paid off ....
I do not see Stephen Hawking's loss ....
Okay, Steven could loosen his assets. That's a lot better than losing them. I would much rather have loose assets than to lose them altogether. I wonder if Steven's assests are just loose, or are they loosy goosy? Hmmm.
Watch out people. The grammar police are quick on the draw tonight.
Hawking has made his fame not on physics, but on publishing pseudo-physics books for entertainment of the masses. The fact that he was wrong is not surprising.
Nope! The BEST thing about it is that Hawking lost. He is quite dense over rated and would do quite well to digress. From the public.. ; ]
Cheers
Joe, BIG BANG THEORY was Hawking. Hawking radiation coming from black holes, was Hawking. The most successful popular science book ever, A Brief History Of Time, was Stephen Hawking. You are VERY VERY ignorant. Back to school, dummy
bigbenalaska: my boots are loose.
0 for 4? He still has time to change his biggest bet or he will be 0 for 5.
The guy just bets with his heart, not with his head.
And even when he is such a brilliant mind, his ego gets in the way many times. He has learned to respect others such as Leonard Susskind. For a while he looked down on him, because Susskind is a genius that started out working as a plumber.
He has learned that he is not the "Einstein" that he thought he was. He has made some big mistakes in his theories and other people have proved him wrong.
I am surprised to see so many people who realize that Hawking is not as smart as he thinks he is. He is also very arrogant and condescending to people who question him or his theories. This article is not surprising to people who actually are aware of his work.
I don't wish him ill though, just would rather see a humble Hawking.
When Stephen Hawking said that the scientific narrative was complete and that there is no need for religion, I had to disagree. Not because religion is factual. Goodness no. Because if the scientific narrative is complete then, as a species, we know absolutely everything about everything. I cannot possibly predict when the scientific narrative will be complete. Honestly, it may never be complete. Our species may go extinct before we complete the narrative.
As to religion, it has psychological value. As was said in the movie 'Second Hand Lions', "Sometimes the most important things for a man to believe are the things that aren't true." Things like good triumphing over evil, true love never dying, and a whole bunch of other wonderful fluff that keeps people holding on and keeps driving them forward. Religion is one of those things, and although in the context of factual information there is no need for religion, there will always be a psychological need for religion.
Amazing to me that persons in this forum have the nerve to even suggest that Mr. Hawking "is not as smart as he thinks he is" or "he is quite dense, overrated and would do well to digress" and other terms used...
This man ponders theory and debates with the smartest and brightest on our planet. To find that he is making $100 bets on matters that are so far out of the reach of understanding of all but a handful makes him very normal and... I like the guy!
I think Hawking is a very brilliant individual and it is even more amazing what he does considering his physical disability. Now do I think he is the next coming of Einstein or that everything he says is right and should automatically become a law of physics? No, and thankfully the scientific community doesn't work that way. The main issue is the media hypes this up more and you often seem to get people writing about him, his and/or other scientific theories who have no idea what they are talking about but instead grab onto coined phrases like "God Particle" and wet their pants over it. I've not read his books but I've seen some of his shows and I know that he has been wrong and admitted it or changed his stance as well. To me as long as he can go back and say yup I was wrong then ok. He is a smart man no doubt. He deals with things that many cannot comprehend or begin to imagine. The one plus I think is that at least this gives some attention to science (in lieu of other worthless nonsense we see reported on day in and out) and makes others that more eager to disprove or prove his theories. Win win for all.
As to those injecting religion into this, please take it else where. You are as bad as those who want to inject politics into every discussion. Personally I admit there are many, many things we don't know or understand about our universe. Perhaps there is some type of higher plain of existence. I don't know. I have no problem with a little faith and being a little spiritual can be a good thing, but don't let it blind you either. If you want to believe you walk in the clouds after death or you just die and that is it fine. Just respect others as best as possible, keep an open mind, learn to think for yourself, and understand that there are things we thought or think happen/happened one way but we may discover that it was all wrong and there is a new way to look at the universe. Both sides should remember this. It is part of our species learning and growing up.
It is time
There big black holes. The one at the center of our galicsy that all of the stars spin around has been found. Nightly there are stars found moving when they look at the center of our galicsy. Moving and it is not with time photography. The only thing strong enough to move stars at that rate are big black holes.
Does that mean that I am also like Stephen Hawking ....
Because I also made an error in something .... "LOL"
And I wish my boots were a little looser ....
Or maybe I'll lose them and get some new comfy ones .... "LOL"
Have fun ....
I'm with you Big Ben... Too many stuffed shirts on this thread!
Mr Hawking appears to be having fun, as evidenced by his lighthearted betting tactics. I'll bet myself that he's getting a hoot out of all the spellcheckers and the lofty "scientific" minds berating each others entries. I know I am!
Hawking may not be as smart as he thinks he is, but he is still smarter than all of us.
Losing. Losing. Losing.
Thank you for this article. People always quote Hawking as if everything he says is the Gospel Truth. However, he can be wrong just like everyone else.
Loss for Hawking, Win for the Physics community.
I certainly disagree with your conclusion but then again I'm a scientist myself and perhaps I see this from Hawking's perspective. When you are contemplating things so groundbreaking and universe-changing a little bet serves many purposes, winning or losing is almost irrelevant. The point the article was trying to illustrate is that Hawking often bets not on what he believed was the right answer, but rather on what he was hoping for... a little bit like when you place a bet on your home team despite the fact that Vegas bookies see it otherwise.
Public bets also provide a conduit to an often anti-science leaning American public and this serves to win good-will, raise awareness, educate and even helps raise funding for basic science research.
If you think Hawkings is revered because what he says is the Gospel truth you are missing the point on several levels. First obviously is that he has already recently and with some infamy stated that there was no need for a divine creator to explain the universe and its origins. So, what he says rarely has anything to do with Gospel or religion. Perhaps you were just using that as a common expression but I think you also fail to understand that theorists greatness isn't necessarily and often isn't tied to their ability to predict the future (as in experimental results proving or disproving a theory - there would be no need to run an experiment if anyone knew for certain what the outcome would be). The greatness of a scientist, like theoretical physicists, is to be able to frame experiments that uncover the truths of the universe. This is a much more profound ability than the ability to win bets on the outcome of any said experiment.
In other words great scientists are great because they figure out how to setup experiments that discover great things and not because they can predict the future.
Many people, most even, have this misconception that great theorists like Einstein created their masterpiece theories based on brain-power and super-human feats of genius. Well, there may be some genius in Einstein's work but his theories were based on the results of a number of physical experiments being conducted contemporaneously or prior to his work.
I think a loss (in this case a public bet) by Hawking is in fact a win for the entire scientific community.
I really think you missed my point. It was that many people who are not scientists themselves and have little understanding of physics, cosmology or anything of that nature, read an article about him or see some special he has on the discovery channel and assert that it is all fact because Stephen Hawking says so. I find it annoying.
I was using Gospel Truth as a figure of speech. Although I will pose to you "Quid est Veritas?"
OK I'll bite on this. What experiments were conducted at the time or prior to Einstein that related to his theory of relativity either general or special?
Thank you for plagiarizing the last sentence in my first post in this thread.
Go to bed GBR. You are getting cranky.
I'm sure Hawking actually bets against what he hopes for. That way, if his dreams are shattered, he'd at least have a consolation prize.
He actually stated that in his article (or something very near that)
Pure Science is the Ultimate Art Form and the Ultimate Religion.
NO jym, you are wrong. Science is a means to an end, an answer to a question, an explanation of benefits, if you will.
Art has no meaning. It is a visceral experience that is different in each human being exposed to it with little actual benefit.
Both may raise questions, but only science can answer them.
Religion on the other hand, is a matter of faith, not fact, not theory. Religion is a belief system without proof or support of any kind. Humans are unique in this respect and it defies all scientific explanation.
spot on skip. religion is not a science, or an art. religion is a misunderstanding. The idea of religion has become a hindrance on our development to grow and evolve. It makes men and women complacent and fearful. Before the bible and this teaching of jesus, there were "gods" that we had to please in order to do anything. Pray for crops, good weather, blah, blah, blah...it is a waste of time. And has been. Religious people will say what if your wrong, you will go to hell. If that's the case so be it. Im a good person and if that's what the "gods" or as people believe now "god" Jebus" well then scew' em. There inability to make themselves truly known (jesus and his daddyo) makes me say to religious folks, What if your wrong. you just wasted your time here on a wonderful planet talking to yourself like a nut case. Not god. you could have done things for yourself instead of putting faith in your imaginary friend. Dummies. :)
My, my. What will these rascals be up to next?
whooooooooops ....
Way to miss Skip's point and to completely misunderstand religion. Are you mad at all the bible thumpers telling you "you're going to hell"? Don't hate man.
Skip:
Your bold statement "No jym, you are wrong" requires proof.
Do you have any?
No it does not require proof. Jym rendered an opinion. Skip followed with an opposing viewpoint and cited his reasoning. It is subjective.
Please try to understand the difference between something that is objective and something that is subjective.
Art - Subjective
Science - Objective
Religion - Subjective
Mathematics - Objective
Beauty - Subjective
Ignorance - Obvious
See the difference there?
No doubt we have alot to discover in space. As we do with diseases on earth. Who ever, what ever, I wish them the best of luck on their search.
"It has been announced that with physics, there is no need for a Creator. Without a Creator, there is no need for physics".
Gadzooks, you've discovered the anti-profound particle!
Good point. Even if this discovery proves to be true, the boson particle had to come from somewhere, right? It certainly didn't appear out of the blue nothing. And to suggest that this little particle is responsible for the creation of the universe? Surely, there must be gazillions of bosons out there.
Hawking is overrated. He also said heaven is a "fairy tale", and I believe he is wrong AGAIN
That will never, ever be subject to a wager, though. You can't call him wrong without dying first. Otherwise, well, prove heaven, if you would.
Stick to the religion pages and let the adults talk here.
Can you prove him wrong? The operative word here is PROVE. If you don't know what that means, you can google it. I think your work is cut out for you. Did you even see the episode where he proves there was no god? Or are you just runnig off at the mouth?
If you believe heaven is actually, really, factually real then you probably have no qualifications to be commenting on science or things in the real world. You have Google, look it up... any legitimate science source will explain how the real world works and nowhere will you find heaven, ghosts, zombie gods, or life-after-death. That religious stuff you appear to believe in is the lazy alternative to taking the time to learn the facts before deciding you know how the universe works. Just because cave-men wrote it down doesn't mean it's true. I mean really, I don't trust much of what is written today much less Stone-Age scribblings from thousands of years ago. I know you take solace in the fact that the majority believes in cave-era explanations of the universe... again that has nothing to do with what is fact and what isn't. In fact, every single person in the world can believe something to be true when in fact it isn't... like the fact that the world is flat. That was a universal and obvious truth for millennia... not so much today. Don't feel too confident that the majority is more likely to be correct about something than even a tiny minority. The facts are the facts. There is no heaven.
Just as a FYI, science isn't in the business of proving superstitious beliefs false because that's impossible. Just as it's impossible to prove there aren't little hamster-wheels inside your body somewhere creating energy for your body. See, hamster wheels cannot be detected in our universe and cannot be seen... you simply must have faith that they are there. I can prove how your body actually generates energy but I can't prove a general claim false in every infinite and changing circumstance and designed NOT to be provable (like heaven and God). Then again it seems likely that you don't distinguish between factual evidence and dogma. Make up your own mind Crystal-569996 but I hope you can see it boarders on silly for you to post such a comment.
As seen here: 4 bigots, 6 morons.
TheOverlord, seems that for a scientist you have a very narrow mind when it comes to proving or disproving something that may or may not exist. These scientist had a hunch something existed and experimented until it was proven. So in your narrow mindedness you just shut the book on proving that Heaven is not real you did not test the theorys. Everyone still flocks to theorys and beleive they are real (nobody has ever proven the Theory of Relativity, but it is still taken as fact). I cannot prove that these scientist were right or wrong, that is not my job. I am not a scientist nor am I a priest, but I can tell you that I am open minded enough to beleive in what I feel is a right or a wrong.
Scientist need to be open minded that maybe a higher being created all this stuff for you to figure out. I will continue to beleive in Heaven and God, because whether I am right or wrong, when I die, I would have rather been wrong in beleiving in heaven and God.
I'll be sure to let Sir Isaac Newton know that he should have never have spoken on matters of science.
Aside from that, Overboard, I've seen you make a ton of heavy handed statements about religion but I haven't seen you make any insightful posts about the science end of this stick. Heck, reading your posts is like watching ants trying to comment on a space shuttle launch...
So tell us, Overboard. How do you think this discovery will bode on, let's say, MoND theory? Not that I'm a great mind myself but I would be willing to hear the thoughts of anyone as enlightened on the subject as you are.
And religion finds it's way into a science article again. Ug.
As a scientist you must, must, must be critical... it is central to the scientific method. My opinions mean almost nothing and neither do yours. As far as science is concerned hunches, conjecture, hope and feelings are irrelevant. If you have ANY evidence that heaven, god or any other superstitious dogma is factual then by all means present it... otherwise it is a fairy tale. Since not one single piece of objective evidence has ever supported the existence of heaven or god it is not worth consideration.
East Coast:
Isaac Newton died in 1727. Charles Darwin didn't publish On the Origins of Species until 1859.
I routinely use the logic described with reference to the black hole wager - be pessimistic, so you can either be proven right or be happy you were proven wrong.
Higgs Boson played Right Field for the Clevland Indians in the late 50's. He posted a lifetime .243 in 4 years. Nothing special
similar to an untouchable ufo. when its usable lets talk.
They JUST found it. Nobody should use it yet, they'll get scratches on it
now that nay actually make sense . Itch the wrong place and who knows.
Should we really expect anything less than an 0 for 3 from Hawkings? I've attempted to read some of his books but I get bored due to their similarity to palm readings. I appluad Hawkings for his knowledge of physics and his efforts to unravel our Universe, however, the press and the physics community have given Hawkings too much credit for what? His contribution to theoretical physics seems minimal. Nothing against Hawkings but I'm getting rather tired of the Hawkings hype. Must we get his opinion on everything physics? Maybe now the world will realize that he is merely just an average theoretical physicist, not the next Einstein. Hawkings should really focus all of his efforts on his colaboration in brain wave research as his creativity and knowledge could greatly impact the lives of the disabled.
Ya, keep misspelling his name on purpose, makes you look real smart
Hawkings? Who is Hawkings? I don't believe you ever read Steven Hawking, but you may have read Hawkings. Wasn't he a children's book author?
Busted!
You might make your quota before the hour is erp....er...up I mean.
Can't get me for that one, I corrected myself.
Yeah ! Eat it suckers !
If i was stuck in a power chair and looked like him, I would be a loser also.
slayer hope the curve ball misses you
No kidding. I'm just wondering how he manages to interrupt anybody. He can't talk.
Reading this forum is like watching ants comment on a space shuttle launch...
If you have witnessed that then we really have something to talk about!
Overlord,
No one is forcing you to read it. Maybe it is your Masochistic inner child coming out.
Well Slayer, you probably would, being who you probably are.
Looks like only one or two of ya'll have any clue what the article means anyway...
true will it be shared
I would bet $100 that you are wrong Texas88.
texas,
I'll bet that you are not one of them either
If I won $100 from Stephen Hawking, I would frame it and never spend it.
Existence of Higgs Boson, and how to find it, etc... was published in 1979:
M. A. Shifman, A. I. Vainshtein, M. B. Voloshin and V. I. Zakharov, Low-energy
theorems for Higgs boson couplings to photons, Sov. J. Nucl. Phys. 30 (1979) 711
[Yad. Fiz. 30 (1979) 1368].
After this, if you bet against them, you lost.
Most likely these 4 authors will be up for Nobel Prize soon.
I am amazed at how many folks are giving opinions on material they know little about, it's like a First Grader giving a review of "War and Peace".
How would you know?
Did you actually finish War and Peace?
I started it in the first grade but the second grade got in the way so I put it down.
Never did get back to it. How did it end?
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts - Senator Moynihan
Opinions are usually based on thoughts and feelings that are often thrown together quickly facts are not.
How much do you Know about the subject sir?
War and Peace? Do you mean Warren Peace? I know that Dude I raced him once seem to take forever...........:)
VA..I was thinking the same thing. It appears that a few peoples ADD meds have run out. Partical Physics is a little over my head being a retired truckdriver but I am a fan of Hawking. As my Grandfather said, " If you can't intelligents to the conversation, just let it go boy, just let it go.
I'm still trying to figure out how a pound of coffee keeps shrinking. It's down to 11 ounces. That means 31.25% of its mass is - or is not - in another universe, depending on whether the black hole of greed actually leaks or not.
Try drinking tea.
There is a song about it..."Tea for Two and Two for Tea"...etc. etc.
Works out evenly though.
Unless you're from Boston.
I'm still trying to separate the Gluteus from the Maximus.
If you pay taxes then you will have no trouble whatsoever.
Surely Professor Hawking is going to win both these bets eventually!
Much to do about Nothing is the problem here. The so called God particle proves nothing and that is assuming the the Hadron Collider information isnt faulty. Hawking is the Dumbest smart person I know of. Most of these types are that way though. You have to remember that physics is all theory. It only works where we are. All of physics goes to Hell in a black hole. nothing works as it should there soit is possible for physics to not work everywhere.
Yeah, all theory... I guess you never see those purely theoretical "electrons" anywhere, do you. I guess the computer you use runs on donkeys instead.
And medical PET scans are really just done by a bunch of monkeys drawing pictures of your brain, and it's not really using any of those all theoretical "positron" anti-matter stuff.
Sigh.
Ihateliberals, I was not aware that FOX NOT_NEWS had discussions on Particle Physics. Sorry for my sarcasm, but it leaked out of my black hole.....
Man, who do you hang out with?
your comment tells a lot about you. Just what are you doing reading ANYTHING in the Tech&science section on MSN?
i know 3 year old kids smarter than him.they believe in god, he has gambled there is not , thus he will lose again
3 year old kids also believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.
only because someone who is supposed to be smarter teaches them. Hawking etc perpetuating adult fantasy.Merry Christmas.
R. Omeo, Yes, I agree: "only because someone who is supposed to be smarter teaches them." Religion and a belief in a god or gods are also taught. The existence of so many gods and religions that is proof that most have to be false. It follows that if 99+% of all the gods and goddesses which humans have ever worshiped are false, then it is unlikely that the latest and greatest is true. Yet supposedly intelligent people continue to spread these myths. Religion has been compared to a type of parasite that infects the human mind somewhat like a computer virus.
Your talking about a guy that spent 30 years ramming his black hole theory down other scientists throats then disproved his own theory. This is his greatest claim to fame. At this point, wiping himself is a theory to him.
Actually, Hawking is a four time loser, not three. He is betting there is no Supreme Being. That be big loser.
And in what manner, that we all can see (don't tell me 'he'll know, when he dies,' for the rest of us cannot determine that), will you prove to him that he has lost that 'bet...?'
Michiganres: Isn't being "open minded enough to believe in what I feel" kind of the opposite of being open minded? Especially when combined with a belief based on perceived potential for a big personal pay-off in the end. Scientists like Hawking bravely base their "truth" and worldview on observation and reason.
A black hole with stuff leaking out of it is definitely not "safe". :D
See, even the best can make mistakes. I made a mistake one time - I thought I'd been wrong about something, but it turned out that I had been right, after all. :D