Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Meeting Stephen Hawking

Hey Folks,

Last night I went to see Stephen Hawking, the genius quantum physicist who has ALS. My friend Bob got tickets even though it was sold out long ago. Bob, Rebecca, my pops, Serrana, Dave D. and Dan saw the lecture with me. It was at Zellarbach Auditorium on the Cal Berkeley Campus. About seven years ago the Diablo Ballet did a performance with an orchestra playing "End of the Beginning" at that same place.

Before the lecture a writer from the SF Chronicle asked me some questions. He was really sweet even though he hadn't known who I was.

Hawking was great. He had pre-written his speech and had it spoken from his computer. I may not necessarily agree with all of his theories (Hell, I don't even understand many of them), but it is so beautiful when a genius speaks. His words and his presence get people thinking and talking about deep stuff. He was also making hilarious jokes.

After the show Dave got us all to the back of the place where they were expecting to meet me later. I wanted to give Hawking my CD's Perspective, and Perpetual Burn, plus a letter I wrote to him. Among other things I told him I loved him in the Simpsons, Futurama and Star Trek.

Actually the main reason I wanted to meet him was I wanted to show him how I communicate. He has a great system with his computer for lectures and stuff like that, but it is so cumbersome and slow for regular conversation. His friends ask him questions and a few minutes later he answers them, but by then, they forgot what he is answering. It must be so frustrating for the modern day Einstein. Also, what if the power goes off for a long period of time?

When Dave told Stephen's caregiver about my communication system, he was intrigued by the speed of it. It might not work for him though because Stephen's eyes might not be strong enough. Man, I hope they are. Of all people, Hawking needs to communicate faster than most people on earth. His words are precious.

We waited outside for him while he ate dinner. When he came out I said, "it is such an honor to meet you." Almost a minute later he said, "nice to meet you too." He took my little package and I got out of his hair. What a thrill. I was hoping he wouldn't test me on physics. I would have challenged him to a thumb wrestle but I heard he had lost a lot of hand movement. Sad. He has had ALS for 45 years, give or take. Awesome. Thank you, everyone who made that happen.

I am really sorry about all the spam. That crap is hell of annoying. This space is about the love, baby, not ******** ads. I usually don't mind a little band stuff but it is mainly for my brothers and sisters. Let's just have fun, thoughts, feelings, stories, insights; you know, love, man.

Sorry about the last blog about the ashram. It was mistakenly put there by a caregiver. It happened back in November.

Peace and love,

Jason


Jason Becker

http://www.myspace.com/72303306

World-famous physicist gets rock-star welcome
BERKELEY: More than 2,000 fans turn out to hear scientist's take on deep, dark mysteries of the universe
By Betsy Mason


CONTRA COSTA TIMES
Physicist Stephen Hawking held a sold-out crowd rapt Tuesday night with a brief history of man's quest to understand the universe.

As the crowd waited for Hawking to appear, Zellerbach Hall was tense with the kind of excitement and anticipation usually reserved for rock stars. It felt as though the likes of Mick Jagger was about to strut out onto the stage at any moment, rather than a scientist.

But when Hawking, who uses a wheelchair, rolled onto the stage, more than 2,000 people broke into enthusiastic, long-lasting applause that finally gave way to a reverent silence.

An additional 760 watched from a packed Wheeler Auditorium, where the talk was simulcast.

Star-struck students, scientists and locals, who paid as much as $25 to be there, were on the edge of their seats for several minutes, waiting for the world-famous physicist to shine a light on the deep, dark mysteries of the universe.

Hawking, who has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease, broke the silence by asking, "Can you hear me?" using a speech synthesizer.

The surreal quality of the computerized voice added to Hawking's larger-than-life persona as he gently led the audience from early ideas about the beginning of the universe, through the debate about whether the universe had a beginning or has always existed, to modern scientific understanding of the big-bang theory, the expansion of the universe and the formation of stars and galaxies.

"We are getting close to answering the age-old questions: Why are we here? Where did we come from?" he said.

Hawking, who is best known for his research on black holes and his popular science books "A Brief History of Time," "The Universe in a Nutshell" and "A Briefer History of Time," was instrumental as a young graduate student in the 1960s in determining that the universe did in fact have a beginning by disproving the idea that the universe had contracted before it began expanding 15 billion years ago.

He explained to the crowd how the laws of science have shown that the universe began as a tiny, incomprehensibly dense spot, a billion-trillion-trillionth of a centimeter and exploded through a period of rapid expansion or inflation, and how slight wrinkles in the microwave radiation emitted by the big bang gave birth to the stars.

"The irregularities in the early universe will mean that some regions will have slightly higher density than others. The gravitational attraction of the extra density will slow the expansion of the region, and can eventually cause the region to collapse to form galaxies and stars," he said. "We are the product of quantum fluctuations in the very early universe. God really does play dice."

The auditorium rang with laughter at times as Hawking cracked jokes about how creationists have put the beginning of the universe at 9 a.m. on Oct. 27, 4004 B.C., and how earlier in his career he managed to escape the Pope's notice at a cosmology conference in the Vatican.

"I was glad he didn't realize I had presented a paper at the conference, suggesting how the universe began," he said. "I didn't fancy the thought of being handed over to the Inquisition, like Galileo."

Though he doesn't yet have all the answers to the big questions about the universe, Hawking is optimistic that someday scientists will get there.

"In time we can hope to understand it completely," he said. "We have long enough as the universe should last forever."

Betsy Mason covers science and the national laboratories. Reach her at 925-847-2158 or bmason@cctimes.com.