Stephen Hawking says Heaven is a Fairy Story

Stephen Hawking says Heaven is a fairy story [Excerpts]

British scientist Stephen Hawking has branded heaven a "fairy story" for people afraid of the dark, in his latest dismissal of the concepts underpinning the world's religions.

The author of 1988 international best-seller "A Brief History of Time" said in an interview with The Guardian published on Monday that his views were partly influenced by his battle with motor neurone disease.

"I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first," he told the newspaper.

"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."

Hawking's stance on religion has hardened significantly in the nearly quarter century since the publication of his seminal work on the cosmos.

In "A Brief History of Time" he suggested that the idea of a divine being was not necessarily incompatible with a scientific understanding of the Universe.

But in his 2010 book "The Grand Design" he said a deity no longer has any place in theories on the creation of the universe in the light of a series of developments in physics.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.4f8ccccd2e38de074f4c1305131c47e4.491&show_article=1

[TBC: As the author notes, Hawking’s stance has hardened. This reflects more of the state of a man’s heart than an appeal to objective proof. In truth, it is not a matter of being afraid of the dark, it is a question of “light,” and in particular regarding our appearing before the Creator who is dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto” (1 Timothy:6:16Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.
See All...).]