Stephen Hawking has resolved great mysteries, including subjects related to cosmology, general relativity and quantum gravity. The revered British scientist has mastered the conundrum of measuring and studying black holes. But now the generation’s greatest polymath has turned his attention to more mundane issues, including why in the hell people would want to have Donald Trump as President of the United States.
Hawking, who is physically-disabled and bound to a wheelchair, took exception to the candidate’s mockery last year of a reporter with a debilitating joint condition, but it is Trump’s affronts to science, bordering on fascist anti-intellectualism, that Hawking finds most distasteful.
The physicist openly derided Trump’s claims that childhood vaccines, the most important life-saving advance of the past hundred years, are linked to autism or other diseases. Hawking also laughed at Trump’s claims that he’ll bring water to drought-stricken California.
Speaking on ITV’s morning show through a computer to generate voice signal, Hawking criticized Trump as "a demagogue who seems to appeal to the lowest common denominator."
Trump has been accused of appealing to popular desires and prejudices in order to sidestep rational debate on the issues of the day by employing childish taunts about his past opponents like “Little Marco,” "Low-energy Jeb," and "Lyin’ Ted," or his future challengers like "Crooked Hillary" and "Crazy Bernie."
Trump has also blasted liberal Senator Elizabeth Warren for her claims to Native American heritage by dubbing her “Pocahontas.” He has also promised a transformation into something more “presidential.”
The question remains whether the man who says "I have the best words, I went to the best school, I’m like very smart guy" will indeed change his ways.
