“What we got here is failure … to communicate.” was the iconic line from the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke, starring Paul Newman. A petty criminal sentenced to two years on a Florida prison farm, Luke was a rebel with an unbreakable will. Even in the face of repeated stints in the prison’s dreaded solitary confinement cell, “the box,” his bravado made him a hero to his fellow convicts.
Imprisoned in a deteriorating body and confined to the box of a wheelchair, Dr. Stephen Hawking (who died in mid March at age 76) was a different kind of cowboy. He shared a brilliant scientific mind as the world’s most renowned living physicist.
Photo Courtesy of the Washington Post
Although he developed the inability to speak on his own, Dr. Hawking is recognized as one of physics’ all-time great communicators. Dr. Hawking shared his theories through a speech synthesizer that he operated by twitching a muscle in his cheek. When given the option for a less electronic voice, Dr. Hawking refused; he did not want to lose his individuality.
Communicate with Confidence
Despite his illness, Dr, Hawking was a compelling speaker, who knew how to face audiences in person and through the media. Skillfully using his public appearances as a communications tool to promote scientific discoveries.
Perhaps most well-known for his best-seller, A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking described the universe in humorous, non-technical terms. As in, “What did God do before He created the universe?”
“Even mere survival would have been a medical marvel, but of course he didn’t just survive. He became one of the most famous scientists in the world,” said Martin Rees, the UK’s astronomer royal. “Acclaimed as a world-leading researcher in mathematical physics; for his best-selling books about space, time and the cosmos; and for his astonishing triumph over adversity.”