Cambridge, England — Stephen Hawking, the star physicist who has survived a remarkable 38 years with motor neuron disease, almost didn't make it to a week of festivities marking his 60th birthday.
"I had an argument with a wall a few days after Christmas and the wall won," he explained Friday to an audience of about 400 scientists and friends gathered for a day of lectures celebrating his contribution to theoretical physics and cosmology.
Famed physicist Stephen Hawking is seen at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences, at the University of Cambridge, England. Leading scientists from around the world gathered at the center to attend a 60th-birthday symposium celebrating Hawking's contribution to fundamental physics and cosmology. Hawking suffers from a form of motor neuron disease.
Hawking, who is paralyzed and speaks with the aid of a computer voice synthesizer, suffered a broken right femur when he was thrown from his motorized wheelchair last month. He had been speeding down a narrow lane in the city to meet his wife, Elaine.
Opening his lecture, titled "60 Years in a Nutshell," an allusion to his best-selling book "The Universe in a Nutshell" Hawking told the audience: "It was nearly '59.97 Years in a Nutshell."'
Hawking made it to the entire week of events laid on by Cambridge University, including a birthday party Tuesday.
"It has been a glorious time to be alive and doing research in theoretical physics," Hawking said in his lecture. "Our picture of the universe has changed a great deal in the last 40 years and I am happy if I have made a small contribution."
"He's had more seminal creative ideas than many of his colleagues have produced in the last 50 years," said friend and fellow physicist Kip Thorne, a professor at California Institute of Technology.
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