If Steven Hawking wasn't in a wheelchair, would have have been famous?

Would Einstein be as famous if it wasn't for that famous picture of him sticking his tongue out with his funny electoshock hair?

Anyway, I don't see many scientists leaving their tributes today saying stuff like 'he was the greatest since Einstein'. He was a cultural figure as much as a scientific great.

And the question as to who was greatest - Einstein or Hawkin - was settled in their epic rap battle :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn7-fVtT16k

MLS? wrote:

Maybe Mouse wrote:

in fairness, it should be pointed out that the following are two distinct events:

1) Getting diagnosed with MLS

2) Being relegated to a wheelchair for transportation

Hawking had Major League Soccer? Must have been tough with ALS.

Good little boy catch!

Of course he would have been famous. Nobody recovers from ALS.

help me understand wrote:

Any science experts on here? I'm pretty well educated (Ivy league degree but not in the sciences) but am far from an astrophysicist. Can someone tell me if Hawking was a great scientist? Or is just a famous one?

Watch the movie The Theory of Everything which is essentially a Stephen Hawking biography. It is funny at times.

No.

He's known mainly for his theories about black holes. There are other scientists with theories about black holes too, and none are famous. Respected, leaders in their field maybe, but not celebrities.

help me understand wrote:

Can someone tell me

He would have been a genius that walks.

Hawking was, no doubt, brilliant but "genius/brilliant mind, trapped in a quickly failing body" made for a compelling human interest story, which gave him a lot of notoriety with the general public. Otherwise, Hawking would be no more well known outside of physics than Leonard Susskind or Ed Witten. There are other brilliant physicists out there, but they dont have the name recognition with the general public that Hawking gained.

You Shallow wrote:

help me understand wrote:

Can someone tell me

He would have been a genius that walks.

Taking someone who is paralyzed from ALS out of their wheelchair does not make them able to walk.

If Hawking wasn't in a wheelchair, he probably would have just been confined to his bed. The lack of mobility would have made him less productive, but he probably still would have been able to accomplish enough to be famous.

sdagdafsd wrote:

.pdf, but I guarantee nobody reading this post has heard of everyone in the top 10.

Colditz, that's a prison right?

Without his handicap he wouldn't have been as big of a celebrity, prominent yes, icon no. Other figures like Roy Kerr did a lot of work on black holes to moderate professional. I think Hawkins fame took away from Higg's status A Brief History of Time is a good read though.

moderate professional ^status

No. Do any of you know who Ed Witten is?

reasonsnottobefamous wrote:

Would he have been famous if he was a woman, or not white, or not english speaking? Maybe not. Does that detract from him as a person?

I did a B.Sc. in Astronomy in the 80s and he was barely mentioned on courses from what I can recall. Black hole radiation may have been mentioned but only in passing.

But if he helped get people interested in science and study it or take it up as a career that's just as worthwhile.

I've never heard of have.

I’m pretty sure discovering Hawking radiation would have made him famous regardless

I don't understand why so many people here seem to think that Hawking wouldn't have had ALS if he wasn't in a wheelchair.

He was also a man or morals:

Stephen Hawking, the world-renowned scientist who passed away on Wednesday at the age of 76, was known not only for his groundbreaking work but also for his support for Palestine.

Hawking, who had motor neurone disease, made headlines in May 2013 when he decided to boycott a high-profile conference in Israel where he was scheduled to speak.

The physicist was working at the Cambridge University in the UK at the time.

The Presidential Conference, an academic event held in Jerusalem, was being hosted by the late Israeli President Shimon Peres.

In a letter Hawking sent to the organisers on May 3, he said the "policy of the present Israeli government is likely to lead to disaster".

READ MORE

Israel bans entry for 20 groups over BDS support

"I accepted the invitation to the Presidential Conference with the intention that this would not only allow me to express my opinion on the prospects for a peace settlement but also because it would allow me to lecture on the West Bank.

"However, I have received a number of emails from Palestinian academics. They are unanimous that I should respect the boycott. In view of this, I must withdraw from the conference.

"Had I attended, I would have stated my opinion that the policy of the present Israeli government is likely to lead to disaster," the letter read.

And, with the approval of Hawking, the British Committee for Universities of Palestine, an organisation of UK-based academics to support the academic boycott of Israel, said in a statement at the time: "This is his independent decision to respect the boycott, based upon his knowledge of Palestine, and on the unanimous advice of his own academic contacts there."

Hawking's decision was widely celebrated by Palestinian activists and academics.

"Palestinians deeply appreciate Stephen Hawking's support for an academic boycott of Israel," Omar Barghouti, a founding member of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement (BDS), said.

"We think this will rekindle the kind of interest among international academics in academic boycotts that was present in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa."

Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian-American journalist, wrote: "When we look back in a few years, Hawking's decision to respect BDS may be seen as a turning point - the moment when boycotting Israel as a stance for justice went mainstream".

I would say his is a very good to excellent scientist. He is a better scientist than Neil de Grasse Tyson by orders of magnitude, but he's not up there with Einstein/Newton/Maxwell/etc.

He is famous because he wrote a book for public consumption (A Brief History of Time) and also because of his physical limitations. I suspect the voice synthesizer was likely more important than the wheel chair. He is also, quite strikingly, a living metaphor for the power of the human mind. He has seen things and understood things no one could every physically experience due to the power of his mind, and did so within the shell of a failing body. There's something compelling about that combination.

A man if morals? Isn't he the dude who left his wife for his nurse?