Stephen Hawking

I don't have much positive to say about motor neurone disease. But it taught me not to pity myself because others were worse off, and to get on with what I could still do.

I believe in universal health care. And I am not afraid to say so.

I entered the health care debate in response to a statement in the United States press in summer 2009 which claimed the National Health Service in Great Britain would have killed me off, were I a British citizen. I felt compelled to make a statement to explain the error.

Time travel was once considered scientific heresy, and I used to avoid talking about it for fear of being labelled a 'crank.'

A few years ago, the city council of Monza, Italy, barred pet owners from keeping goldfish in curved bowls... saying that it is cruel to keep a fish in a bowl with curved sides because, gazing out, the fish would have a distorted view of reality. But how do we know we have the true, undistorted picture of reality?

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

Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in.

I think we have a good chance of surviving long enough to colonize the solar system.

I would like nuclear fusion to become a practical power source. It would provide an inexhaustible supply of energy, without pollution or global warming.

When people ask me if a god created the universe, I tell them that the question itself makes no sense. Time didn__ exist before the big bang, so there is no time for god to make the universe in. It__ like asking directions to the edge of the earth; The Earth is a sphere; it doesn__ have an edge; so looking for it is a futile exercise. We are each free to believe what we want, and it__ my view that the simplest explanation is; there is no god. No one created our universe,and no one directs our fate. This leads me to a profound realization; There is probably no heaven, and no afterlife either. We have this one life to appreciate the grand design of the universe, and for that I am extremely grateful.

So long as the universe had a beginning, we could suppose it had a creator. But if the universe is really completely self-contained, having no boundary or edge, it would have neither beginning nor end: it would simply be. What place, then, for a creator?

There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, and science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.

It is generally recognised that women are better than men at languages, personal relations and multi-tasking, but less good at map-reading and spatial awareness. It is therefore not unreasonable to suppose that women might be less good at mathematics and physics.

Women. They are a complete mystery.

It's time to commit to finding the answer, to search for life beyond Earth. Mankind has a deep need to explore, to learn, to know. We also happen to be sociable creatures. It is important for us to know if we are alone in the dark.

People won't have time for you if you are always angry or complaining.

Even if it turns out that time travel is impossible, it is important that we understand why it is impossible.

As Irving Good realised in 1965, machines with superhuman intelligence could repeatedly improve their design even further, triggering what Vernor Vinge called a 'singularity.'