Dr Stephen Hawking needs your help!

i saw this on Yahoo Answers, its interesting that he should ask on there. The people there were obviously thrilled to have such a prominent guest.

Personally i think we can survive the next 100 years. We are resourceful beings

Originally posted by geek101 We are resourceful beings

And we breed a lot too Look at all the wars and natural disasters around the world over the past 50 years or so. Death tolls keep rising, like the Tsunami for instance, because the population in the area has increased drastically.
Yet in the last few decades we have topped the 6 billion mark. I doubt if even an asteroid whould take us all out.

As to Chaos... we have a saying in my work... Chaos Creates Cash...

The more someone messes things up, the more we need to do to fix it, and that makes for a nice fat paycheck...

Seriously though I think humanity thrives, and survives on chaos. All our advances have come as a result of chaos in some form. If there was no struggle to survive, we would become complacent and lazy, and THAT would spell our doom IMO. The struggle is what makes us strong, lets us overcome obsticles, weeds out the weak.

Look at the good Doctor himself, the sruggle he has overcome to be one of the top and respected physicists today.

Americans may be doomed though.... we HAVE become to lazy and complacent.... its hard to find a group of people these days who want to go out and do things in the world. They would rather stay at home on the computer, and try to change the world by typing at it.

BTW he has a really good website for those who haven't found it yet
Every Thing You Always Wanted to Know about the Universe and Were Afraid to Ask



[edit on 7-7-2006 by zorgon]

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
The Overlord has answered.

Good Lord Skeptic Overlord - could you possibly link us to the page where your answer is? I can't find a feature to jump to the end and there are like 17000 reponses.

Forget it it, just tell us what you said

Originally posted by zorgon
BTW he has a really good website for those who haven't found it yet
Every Thing You Always Wanted to Know about the Universe and Were Afraid to Ask

Ummmmm...... that is not his website, it is the PBS website for him.

Major support for the STEPHEN HAWKING'S UNIVERSE television series was provided, in part, by Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations.

The funding thing clued me in to look at the url.



Shame though - he of all people should have his own website - is there one?

Originally posted by Relentless
he of all people should have his own website - is there one?

Here ya go.

www.hawking.org.uk...

I think that since I, personally, don't expect to survive another 100 years, I tend to not care. I learned quite a while ago that people are aggressively stupid and it's a mistake to think anything is too stupid for them to pull off. Destroy the world? Sure!

The only thing that might be our saving grace is humanity's incredible selfish greed. Back when I used to be in charge of nuclear weapons, people would sometimes ask me if I thought we'd ever have a nuclear war and my answer was always pretty much the same. I doubt we'd ever have a nuclear war, because there's no money in it.

I don't see humanity destroying itself any time soon, because there's no way for somebody to make a buck off it. If something starts to go horribly bad, we usually start throwing money at it until it corrects itself. Massive plague? Throw money! Nuclear missile threat? Throw money! As long as people have money and are willing to toss a lot of it around to solve problems, then we don't have anything to worry about.

Okay, I hardly think he needs our help .

I am extremely intrigued why he would do this though. It appears he joined the site solely to pose this question and it has received over 17000 replies in 3 days.

What I want to know is why he asked it in the first place, that's what I think would be interesting. I can't imagine he has time to read all those responses, what was the point?

I wanna know - I wanna know!

Edit: Thanks Hal - had already found it. Sent him an email too......as if.





[edit on 7/7/2006 by Relentless]

If we changed the rules and guidelines of our society and elected new leaders based on new rules, regulations and personal qualities which would be more intune with the forefathers orginal intent. Ended any current wars and created peace treaties then have world wide meetings and discussions to talk about the concept of intergration of a one world government based on peace, love and more importantly unity of our world. With like-minded goals of taking away poverty/disease/destruction ect. based on peace and unity.

We would all have a place in the world with our skills and likes as far as what we would all do for the betterment of our society. The youth could go through school
understanding and learning their own skills and abilitys the schools would help the kids develop those skills and abilitys and find their place in the world. In schools where they would finish this devolpment, then the community which they would work with(according to their skills) would invite them with open arms.(they may also take trips and see the people at work) This would breed excellence taking ones skills and improving on them putting everyone where they need to be to help strengthening society as a whole. We would teach the kids that their talents are very special and unique and that they should take pride and respect their god given talents. We want the kids to be happy and feel good about what they can do and we will develope their skills and hone them in to a fantastically brillant level where they will be absolutely brimming with confidence and talent.

Take away the money system ending poverty, end the spreading of some diseases,
end the seperation of our people within class/classifications since we will all be just as important as any other person in what we do whatever that will be. Most crime and hate will leave without the need to "survive" so to speak. Any stragglers of the new society wether they be lazy with no intent of helping their brothers of earth grow or refuse to grow with them ones that still commit crime or hate in any ways will be delt with very very serious and it will be shamed/frowned upon by our society. These people will be banished if they dont stop hurting and destroying our soceity. They will allways have the chance to change in rehab/solitude so they dont further harm society that will be their only chance. They will be released and intergrated back into society if they become better. The rehab centers will be like schools and theripy centers trained in such matters to help people who need it.
The seclusion is for the safty of other people only. It should a very friendly enviroment based on love and compassion to help others.

If we work together as one united earth we could build technologys faster without keeping secrets. Building technology based on being economicaly friendly and ones that dont put a strain on our resources ones that dont destroy/harm/pollute and ones that could protect us and earth from any harm rather then destroy.

Protecting against everything including natural disasters, criminal injustices with re-created law/conviction/rehab catered to help end true dark minded or mentaly ill people and their actions. We should do everything in our power as a whole to end spreading of disease and treat mental personal problems or issues within familys very serious to keep the balance and well being of our people and society peaceful.

I wish people would get of Stephen Hawkings nuts and start thinking for themselves/forming their own opinions. Actually no I don't, most people seem to come up with stupid opinions.

We, (you and I) carry in us information that has been passed down through millions of generations of biological evolution. The information in our DNA is literally 4.5 billion years old.

What is this information? Move, get resources, self replicate, repeat.

To acomplish this nature has produced a massive array of creatures who all have this simple instinct.

WHY IS MAN SO VIOLENT? Because he carries the genes of EVERY SINGLE winner of EVERY SINGLE battle in his evolutionary tree. From bacteria to moss to frogs to fish to lizards to primates... MAN has evolved and carried with him the information and instinct of the strongest and fastest and smartest winner of every evolutionary battle for survival over millions of generations.

It is no wonder he is the most brutal and most war like.

Have you ever seen an animal kill for fun?


In my opinion our environment is not going to be needed because the evolutionary code for life will become silicon based. I believe EVOLUTION will bring about another form of life which will be to man as man is to animal.

In the mean time, the middle class will dissapear, the environment will crash, the earth will shudder violently and most of everyone will die. Wars will be fought over the great lakes and massive plagues will kill entire cities. Our waters will become undrinkable, every facet of life will administered to you.

Your freedoms will no longer exist and your childrens children will have the fight of their lives on when they get here.

Thanks GrandPa

What's scary is that we're going to be our children's children, through reincarnation. You think God made it so that you can escape the Hell that you created? You think we don't have a soul?

Our ancient ancestors talked about how our souls were the energy that rested in our bodies, released once we died. This should have been accepted as truth the moment we discovered electric currents travel our nerves and create storms of thought in our brains. But NOoOOo, we're smarter than they are right? Everything they talked about is stupid right?

We'll see how dumb they are once we die, and are released into the Earth to try to live again. It will suck because there will be no suitable wombs, we will fight amongst ourselves for the healthiest DNA inside them to grow into. The weakest of us will have to live in the firey torment of global warming that will be our Hell. There will be too many souls, not enough healthy bodies.

Originally posted by Mog_of_Eligius
It is no wonder he is the most brutal and most war like.

Have you ever seen an animal kill for fun?

Alot of animals kill for fun. Ever seen a cat kill a mouse for fun?

With rapid and unabated environmental destruction and western society's almost complete removal from agrarian life into a food transportation system leaves most people absolutely dependent upon how our way of life currently operates. If something were to change this, I'm not sure how many people will be able to survive outside this system and live on their own.

And even if there was a sudden massive switch over to a more agrarian lifestyle due to political and economic chaos, the environmental chaos may leave those able to make such a switch unable to live off the land.

I have no idea what is in store for us in the future, but honestly the doomsaying could be grimly accurate.

Apparently Stephen Hawking recently said that the only way man might survive is to escape into space.

Can anyone verify this? A bit scary if it's true. The man is an educated, aware, considered and critical thinker.

Mog_of_Eligius

...the environment will crash, the earth will shudder violently and most of everyone will die. Wars will be fought over the great lakes and massive plagues will kill entire cities. Our waters will become undrinkable, every facet of life will administered to you.

Not just writing on the wall. More like a major billboard.

Yipes, huh?

Mr. Hawking should stick to Quantum Physics, something he knows more about than anyone.

Is this supposed to be a conspiracy of some sort? I thought that is what this site is supposed to be about!

I'd love to help answer Hawking's question but I'm such a moron I can't even get Yahoo to let me. Anyway...

I don't know how humanity will avoid these catastrophes. All I can hope for is that greed overcomes stupidity. Why do I say that? ...because greed being greed is greedy and won't destroy itself. Stupidity is stupid though and it just might.

Dr. Stephen Hawking has a great mind and most answers. Why would he be asking us? Are we supposed to think something greater than he can come up with?

Originally posted by dgtempe
Dr. Stephen Hawking has a great mind and most answers. Why would he be asking us? Are we supposed to think something greater than he can come up with?

I don't think he's gonna pick the best answer from yahoo answers and try and implement the idea, but you never know

Originally posted by SilverSurfer
Also there should be a ban on mixing politics and religion.. i know some countries will not like this, but religion should be separated from politics.

I think you almost have the answer there, but not quite.

Rather than a ban on MIXING politics and religion, why not simply ban them both?

If you look at all of the conflict in the world, somewhere behind each situation you will find politics and/or religion to blame.

We have comfortably enough food to make sure nobody ever goes hungry, enough medicines to treat all of the treatable conditions in the world, so why don't we? Ask the politicans and the religious zealots.

I am not against religious freedom by the way, I just think it should be a private thing not to be discussed in public, like certain other things we do which we don't want anyone else knowing about.

If you want to worship an image of a guy who probably never even existed then that's just fine by me... but why do you feel you have to tell the world and his wife all about it? Do you think they really care? If they did they would already be beside you in your place of worship.

[edit on 8-7-2006 by Englishman_in_Spain]

Originally posted by dgtempe

Dr. Stephen Hawking has a great mind and most answers. Why would he be asking us?

It's a teaching technique, called the Socratic Method - instead of giving people (censored) information and telling them what to think, the teacher asks students pointed questions that lead to research and individual thought.

Think it might work?