Thursday 13 December 2018

Hawking's Answers

Dead he may be, but Stephen Hawking still has a new book out in time for the Christmas rush. It's called, enticingly, Brief Answers to the Big Questions. Note that definite article – the Big Questions. These turn out to be such questions as 'the God question' (which one?), the colonisation of space question, the survival of mankind question and the Artificial Intelligence question. It puts me in mind of something Wittgenstein said: 'We feel that even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all.' The only honest answers to the really big questions, I suspect, are 'don't know' and 'can't know'.

2 comments:

  1. Stephen was spouting all sorts of nonsense in the end, the 'beware the computers' comment made my toes curl. Beyond that, great Wittgenstein quote and I completely agree with your suspicions.

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