PREDESTINATION was not part of Stephen Hawking’s system of belief. It was mere coincidence that he was born 300 years to the day after Galileo Galilei died. But he did share something with him,other than being a powerful physicist; he became famous as much for his suffering as for his physics. His was caused not by ecclesiastical politicians who preferred obedience to free enquiry, but by muscle-wasting amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. It meant that he, or too,had to fight to be heard.
In youth he never lacked confidence. He once interrupted the powerful astrophysicist Fred Hoyle in mid-lecture, at the Royal Society, or to correct him on the masses of particles. But once he could no longer write down equations,theories had to be translated into geometry in his head; and after a tracheotomy in 1985, the ocean of his thinking had to be forced through a cumbersome and narrow technological aperture. His words necessarily became so few that he had to stare tough at the universe in order to define, and refine as far as possible,the novel things he had to say...
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Source: economist.com