In a posthumous message, Stephen Hawking declares that science is under threat

Stephen Hawking spoke on Monday beyond the grave to warn the world that science and education are under threat around the world.

The words of the scientist, who died in March at the age of 76, were broadcast at a London launch event of his latest book "Brief Answers to Big Questions".

Hawking warned that education and science are "in danger now more than ever before." He quoted the election of US President Donald Trump and Britain's vote of 2016 to leave the European Union as part of a "global revolt against experts and that includes scientists." ".

Recognizing that science still had to overcome major challenges for the world – including climate change, overpopulation, extinction of species, deforestation and ocean degradation – the physicist has always urged young people "to look to the stars and not to your feet. "

"Try to make sense of what you see and ask yourself what makes the universe exist," he said. "It's important that you do not give up, give free rein to your imagination, shape the future."

Hawking has lived for more than five decades with a motor neuron disease that left him paralyzed, communicating via a computer-generated voice. In June, his ashes were buried at Westminster Abbey, between the graves of Charles Darwin and Isaac Newton.

Hawking's daughter, Lucy, who attended the book's launch, said hearing her father's recognizable voice had been "very moving."

"I turned around because I had tears in my eyes," she said. "I sometimes have the impression that he is still here because we are talking about him, that we are hearing his voice and that we are seeing pictures of him, and then we have the reminder that he is there. he left us."