# Stephen Hawking: Dead smart guy Nobel-less. What gave? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 14, 2018, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548 "2018-03-14T15:06:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/41 "2018-03-14T21:04:47Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > It could be another hundred years (or more) before Hawkings theories are conclusively proven and then applied to a useful application. > > It’s like the Theory of Special Relativity. Einstein published it in 1905. Generally accepted but it wasn’t conclusively proven and applied until after the Manhattan Project in the early 1940’s. > . > Einstein signed a letter in 1939, urging Roosevelt to support the Manhattan Project and that the potential for a weapon of unprecedented power was possible. > [Einstein–Szilard letter - Wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%E2%80%93Szil%C3%A1rd_letter) Special relativity was tested and applied well before the Manhattan project. Just for an example, Dirac developed the relativistic wave equation in 1928, which explained observed hydrogen spectra and predicted antimatter - which was discovered in 1932. For that matter, special relativity is inherent in general relativity, and thus the 1919 eclipse observations that confirmed general relativity are also confirmations of special relativity. ---
**Author:** ![Asympotically\_fat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47c2d/32.png) [@Asympotically\_fat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asympotically_fat)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/42 "2018-03-14T21:10:51Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Sorry if “respected scientist with significant contributions in his field” wasn’t effusive enough for you.:rolleyes:. The point would be that it could equally apply to a scientist of much lesser academic stature than Hawking, which is why it would be misleading to those who are not fully aware of Hawking’s work in and his effect on his own field. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/43 "2018-03-14T21:22:35Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Your interpretation (and those of others), as I said before, has absolutely nothing to do with what I posted. You are reading into them things that aren’t there. I am happy we got it wrong. I am worried that you view everyone reading your posts as wrong. YOU knew your own mind but apparently it is the reader’s fault for not being a mind reader of Colibri. Anyway, good to see we are on the same page as regards professor Hawking. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/44 "2018-03-14T21:31:34Z")
> [@Asympotically\_fat](#): > > The point would be that it could equally apply to a scientist of much lesser academic stature than Hawking, which is why it would be misleading to those who are not fully aware of Hawking’s work in and his effect on his own field. Oh, the horror!😉 > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > I am worried that you view everyone reading your posts as wrong. No, mostly just you.😉 > [@](#): > > YOU knew your own mind but apparently it is the reader’s fault for not being a mind reader of Colibri. As I said, there is nothing in my posts to support your interpretation. It is the reader’s fault when they are interpolate a meaning that is not there. ---
**Author:** ![Asympotically\_fat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47c2d/32.png) [@Asympotically\_fat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asympotically_fat)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/45 "2018-03-14T21:58:25Z")
I would describe it like this from my own personal perspective: I read A Brief History of Time when I was young (11 maybe?) and it got my interested in physics, even though frankly I didn’t understand it. Now I can read some (but by no means all) of his technical work and follow it, it’s clear what a big contribution he made to his field(s) and quite frankly what a genius he was. It’s also clear to me now that A Brief History of Time does an incredibly lousy job of trying to explain many of the concepts in it and you could pretty much pick another popular physics book covering the same topics at random to get a better popular explanation. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/46 "2018-03-14T22:02:03Z")
I vaguely recall an article where physicists were asked to name the 50 most influential people in their field. Hawking’s name didn’t come up in that list. This planet has a ton of brilliant people in it, and Hawking was likely more of a guy who publicized science for the mainstream than someone who engaged in world class research. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/47 "2018-03-14T22:03:04Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > Just like we’ve never heard of Roger Penrose? :dubious: I don’t think I’d ever heard of Penrose until you made this comment just now. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/48 "2018-03-14T22:36:18Z")
> [@Asympotically\_fat](#): > > It’s also clear to me now that A Brief History of Time does an incredibly lousy job of trying to explain many of the concepts in it and you could pretty much pick another popular physics book covering the same topics at random to get a better popular explanation. Yeah, I didn’t like “Brief History” very much - there are much better popular books about physics. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/49 "2018-03-14T22:45:54Z")
I remember when A Brief History of Time was released. Although a best seller, it was one of those books that few people actually read. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/50 "2018-03-14T22:55:49Z")
Of course, Hawking was remarkable to have overcome ALS to make significant contributions to physics. Though there are many remarkable brains, I think Hawkings contributions are more significant than his popular books, which most did not read. The original book was not written in a crystal clear style, but I think an updated version was somewhat easier to understand. His celebrity was in part due to his contributions but also to the fact his voice and character were instantly recognizable. I’ll miss him. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/51 "2018-03-14T22:58:53Z")
He was more a teacher than a researcher IMHO. You don’t win the Nobel Prize just for teaching. ---
**Author:** ![Itself](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/d07c76/32.png) [@Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/52 "2018-03-14T23:19:38Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > I have a great deal of respect for popularizers. I wish I could have done it, but my specialty is just not ready for it, or else I don’t know how. Does the name John Conway ring any bells. For a while I thought he was an incredibly prolific mathematician with a startlingly diverse range of work. That’s actually true, but part of it was that there are actually two famous mathematicians with that name. Anyway, popularization is fine, but mathematicians and scientists care more about technical accomplishments in their fields than its promotion to laymen; and, more to the point, the former is what gives you publications, tenure, and awards. ---
**Author:** ![jerez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c68b51/32.png) [@jerez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jerez)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2018, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/53 "2018-03-14T23:36:57Z")
Oracle of our times. Congratulations on what appears to be a life well lived, despite it all. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2018, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/54 "2018-03-15T00:12:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Wesley Clark** : > > I vaguely recall an article where physicists were asked to name the 50 most influential people in their field. Hawking’s name didn’t come up in that list. To be fair, the respondents might have been interpreting “their field” rather narrowly, the sort of people whose papers they routinely cite, and who they hope will be citing their papers. If that’s the case, then someone working in, say, semiconductors, or cryogenics, or nonlinear optics, or magnetohydrodynamics, or whatever, might not have even had Hawking on their list at all. He certainly would be in the upper echelons of people working in semiclassical gravity, but they might just not have asked anyone in that field. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2018, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/55 "2018-03-15T22:09:40Z")
Well, as has been noted, he died on appropriately anniversary days for a moral: Galielo’s death and Einsteins birth. Also, if you are not one of the 116 million who’ve already seen it: [Epic Rap Battle: Einstein v Hawking](https://youtu.be/zn7-fVtT16k). ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_Peebles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Jim\_Peebles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_Peebles)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2018, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/56 "2018-03-19T13:42:06Z")
Check out this article from this morning: > **[Two weeks before he died Stephen Hawking predicted 'the end of the universe'](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/stephen-hawking-end-universe-world-death-smooth-exit-eternal-inflation-astrophysics-a8262611.html)** > > The paper could have earned Hawking a Nobel Prize, his co-author says Hawking’s coauthor, Hertog, says he should have won the Nobel prize for a paper they just sumbitted. It is undoubtedly science fiction: among its topics is how to detect alternate universes. I think Hertog is basically saying “nominate me for a Nobel prize” for this wildly speculative paper, and from numerous comments above, that isn’t how the Nobel prize in physics is awarded. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2018, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/57 "2018-03-19T16:14:31Z")
Heck, I’m not a physicist, and in the early 80’s I knew about Hawking Radiation and his black hole work - I was an undergraduate comsci student. Back then the fact that he had ALS was something of a footnote, and not well known, or considered very relevant. I knew what he had done was a reasonably big deal, even if I understood only the basic outline of the physics. Us computer scientists have a curious opinion of Roger Penrose. The AI guys really didn’t like being told what there work actually was. But I have heard him talk a few times and he is basically a really nice very smart guy. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2018, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/58 "2018-03-19T17:46:20Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#): > > Agree. > > It is doubtful he would have become famous had he never succumbed to a debilitating disease. He was mostly functional until the late 1970s, well after he had become famous (though well before _A Brief History of Time_, which made him very famous). > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > From your post I am guessing your specialty is mathematics. If so then it has been popularized. There is a well visited and well regarded YouTube channel called [Numberphile](https://www.youtube.com/user/numberphile). It’s pretty great. Give it a look. There’s also [Carol Vorderman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Vorderman). ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2018, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548/59 "2018-03-19T19:31:19Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > He was mostly functional until the late 1970s, well after he had become famous (though well before _A Brief History of Time_, which made him very famous). I know someone who studied under him late 60’s and early 70’s and he said Hawkings was fairly “normal”, you had to know that he had a disease to notice. He just looked lethargic, which most academics do.😃 IIRC he did not get into a wheelchair full time almost the early 1980’s. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stephen-hawking-dead-smart-guy-nobel-less-what-gave/810548.md?page=2)