We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet.
Stephen HawkingRead
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.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the importance of consciousness and awareness in appreciating beauty in the universe.
Stephen Hawking's quote suggests that while there may be countless sets of physical laws and values that could result in beautiful worlds, without conscious beings to observe and appreciate that beauty, such worlds hold no intrinsic meaning. It emphasizes the significance of awareness and the role of observers in giving value to the universe and its wonders.
In practice
This quote could be used in a speech about the significance of awareness in art appreciation.
We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet.
I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.
It surprises me how disinterested we are today about things like physics, space, the universe and philosophy of our existence, our purpose, our final destination. Its a crazy world out there. Be curious.
I was not a good student. I did not spend much time at college; I was too busy enjoying myself.
The world has changed far more in the past 100 years than in any other century in history. The reason is not political or economic but technological-technologies that flowed directly from advances in basic science. Clearly, no scientist better represents those advances than Albert Einstein: TIME's Person of the Century.
In my opinion, there is no aspect of reality beyond the reach of the human mind.
Very little of the great cruelty shown by men can really be attributed to cruel instinct. Most of it comes from thoughtlessness or inherited habit. Extract from 'Memories of childhood and youth.'
Believe in the holy contour of life.
I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.
Odors have an altogether peculiar force, in affecting us through association; a force differing essentially from that of objects addressing the touch, the taste, the sight or the hearing.
And so they are ever returning to us, the dead. At times they come back from the ice more than seven decades later and are found at the edge of the moraine, a few polished bones and a pair of hobnailed boots.
The Sage has no thinking mind and therefore there are no βothersβ for him.
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