Marshall Barnes Takes Sides Against Hawking On Israeli Tomorrow Conference Boycott:Receives Thanks

June 28, 2013 - PRLog -- Internationally noted research and development engineer Marshall Barnes was thanked for his thoughts by the office of the President's Conference in Israel for his email taking an opposing position to Stephen Hawking's decision to boycott this year's event. Stephen Hawking was invited to speak at the conference which is usually joined by government, art, science, business and other thought leaders from around the world. Hawking had said he would attend but then decided to decline due to health reasons, according to Tim Holt, Cambridge University's director of communications.

Later, however, Hawking's office informed Cambridge University that Hawking was joining the Palestinian boycott of the event, known also as Facing Tomorrow.
( http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/08/stephen-hawking-israel-academic-boycott ). Hawking's decision made international news and raised a lot of vocal protest, but Marshall decided to write the conference's information office to express his opinion.

Marshall, who is perhaps Hawking's greatest critic and has proven Hawking wrong when it comes to the physics of time and non-trivial space-time geometries, something that he was recognized for in part by the Ohio General Assembly last year, found himself opposing Hawking again, this time on the issue of Middle East peace.

In the email, dated June 13th, and in what was at times, strident criticism of the British astrophysicist, Marshall said in part,

"If I had been given the same opportunity to address your conference, that Dr. Hawking has squandered, I would speak on the need to seek ways to peace that have not been tried. I would speak of the need for both sides to work for peace as if tomorrow depends on it, because it does. No one wants to see their loved ones killed. Everyone wants their children grow-up, if given the chance. What has to be done is the driving out of the distractions of politics and hatred from the minds of the people, and the intrinsic and inherent desire for a peaceful future of cooperation and prosperity, be given a chance to take seed in the hearts of both the Palestinians and Israelis. Many Israelis already feel this way, as well as a good number of Palestinians. What Israel needs to do is to reach out to those futurists like me and seek ways of waging peace. It is clear that Stephen Hawking is not one of us or he would have had the vision to see beyond the limited scope of his academic fellows. Israel is in one of those rare moments where military security is already established but not guaranteed forever. By waging peace, it is possible to win the war by insuring that war doesn't breakout in the first place. Waging peace is not pacifism nor is it weakness in national security matters. It is the projection and imposition of the concept that peace is possible, peace is more desirable, and peace will be inevitable. If you are attacked and forced to defend yourselves, then it is understandable that you do so, so I am not promoting pacifism in the slightest. I do not believe in pacifism, but I do believe in peace."

Sharon Oxman, Office Manager of the Israeli Presidential Conference, responded by thanking Marshall for his thoughts.

Marshall also touched on the issue of peace in relation to his most recent endeavors with the space industry:

"I recently participated in the International Space Development Conference (see http://isdc.nss.org/2013/speakers-all.shtml ). The theme was Global Collaboration In 21st Century Space and we were all talking about a positive future of exploring space, creating new industries, developing new places for the humanity to expand off this world, something that Dr. Hawking has stated is a requirement if the human race is to survive. But what also must be done is a stronger effort to resolve the conflicts of Mankind or there will be no future world of peace, not even in space. Everywhere, discussions about peaceful space development were being held, reinforced by former President of India A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's address on space solar power and how it could be the key to world peace - but too little about the pragmatic way to get peace achieved. But achieve it we must."

However, Marshall was quick to point out in his email, that he does not give Israel a blank check of support. He stated:

"I am not dispassionate in my opinion, nor completely biased in one direction or the other. I do not always agree with the policies of Israel myself..." indicating that his opposition to Hawking's boycott decision was not simply a pro-Israeli reaction but couched on the premise that every opportunity to speak on great issues should be taken, especially if it helps a peace effort.

Marshall's position on Hawking is squarely focused on the reputation of Hawking being the so-called, "greatest mind on the planet", to which Marshall is famous for having responded that Hawking's actually, "the world's most intelligent comedian". However, Marshall sees nothing funny about Hawking's decision to boycott the conference.

"Stephen Hawking, by boycotting the conference, proved once and for all, the limits of his intelligence. He's not a visionary. A visionary would have gone and spoken with authority on what needs to happen for there to be peace, and done so with new ideas. A visionary would have known that what was called for was a greater dialog, a newer dialog, not a boycott of speech. Any stupid, idiot moron could have done what Hawking did. Clearly, he couldn't see that the opportunity was bigger than the petty politics of his fellow academics, whomever they may be, and that by deciding to boycott the event, he showed that he had nothing of value to say, nothing of value to add. He's been given all these accolades as this generation's supposed Einstein, in the popular media, something that a number other physicists balk at, but when given the opportunity of an international platform from which to say something akin to the way that Einstein used to speak on international affairs, Hawking chose to cop out. That's not exhibiting any genius. That's not the act of a visionary. Certainly not the behavior of an Einstein. That pretty much fits my current opinion of Hawking. On this issue, Stephen was certainly out of his depth, again".

This coming July 4th will mark the first anniversary of Marshall beating Hawking in Hawking's 2008 public bet statement that the Higgs Boson would not be discovered at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN ( http://www.prlog.org/11914207-higgs-boson-announcement-sh... ). Marshall will mark the occasion by publishing an article about why Hawking bet wrong and how it is indicative of Hawking's thinking that has led the British scientist to make so many mistakes.