Lead Image Credit: PA
Every now and then Stephen Hawking says something that I think is definitely complete nonsense. Then I remember he's Stephen Hawking and anything he says should probably be taken as gospel.
Admittedly, I don't really know that much about him but I saw that Eddie Redmayne film so I'm pretty sure he's real smart.
Advert
He has now spoken on post-Brexit Britain (who hasn't) and how it needs to re-evaluate the value it puts on money and material wealth.
He wrote about all this in an essay in The Guardian.
In the piece, he touched upon how the referendum result was driven by attitudes towards wealth and how we value possessions and prioritise wealth.
"I argued during the referendum campaign that it would be a mistake for Britain to leave the European Union," Hawking wrote.
Advert
Credit: PA
"I'm sad about the result, but if I've learned one lesson in my life it is to make the best of the hand you are dealt. Now we must learn to live outside the EU, but in order to manage that successfully we need to understand why British people made the choice that they did."
The professor continues to write that for him money was just a means to an end and that he was never really in a position to appreciate it.
He believes that now our attitudes towards wealth must change. He said: "We will need to adapt, rethink, refocus and change some of our fundamental assumptions about what we mean by wealth, by possessions, by mine and yours. Just like children, we will have to learn to share."
Advert
He then went on to reiterate that these are particularly tumultuous time (something that can't really be denied) and that he believes that we can't continue to become a divided nation.
"If we fail then the forces that contributed to Brexit, the envy and isolationism not just in the UK but around the world that spring from not sharing, of cultures driven by a narrow definition of wealth and a failure to divide it more fairly, both within nations and across national borders, will strengthen," he said.
He raises some great points and while it's quite a heavy read he ends on the point that human beings are endlessly resourceful. He is of course correct but when you consider the current climate it can be supremely difficult to think of anything positive.
Words by Matthew Cooper
Featured Image Credit:Topics: Stephen Hawking