Stephen Hawking

My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all.

There are grounds for cautious optimism that we may now be near the end ofthe search for the ultimate laws of nature.

Someone told me that each equation I included in the book would halve the sales.

Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.

It is no good getting furious if you get stuck. What I do is keep thinking about the problem but work on something else. Sometimes it is years before I see the way forward. In the case of information loss and black holes, it was 29 years.

I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road.

We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.

The usual approach of science of constructing a mathematical model cannot answer the questions of why there should be a universe for the model to describe. Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?

One cannot really argue with a mathematical theorem.

The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired.

To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit.

If we do discover a complete theory, it should be in time understandable in broad principle by everyone. Then we shall all, philosophers, scientists, and just ordinary people be able to take part in the discussion of why we and the universe exist.

Not only does God play dice, but... he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.

Most sets of values would give rise to universes that, although they might be very beautiful, would contain no one able to wonder at that beauty.

I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image.

God not only plays dice, He also sometimes throws the dice where they cannot be seen.

Even if there is only one possible unified theory, it is just a set of rules and equations. What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?

It is not clear that intelligence has any long-term survival value.