As January 8 marks the late Stephen Hawking’s birthday, we unravel one of his most famed space-time theories — singularity

Learning about Hawking in any mathematics, physics or computer science class is a given; in fact, one’s syllabus is wanting without it. He stands out as a rock star among scientists and a beacon among researchers.

As Hawking wrote in A Brief History Of Time (1988), “The role played by time at the beginning of the universe is, I believe, the final key to removing the need for a Grand Designer, and revealing how the universe created itself... Time itself must come to a stop. You can’t get to a time before the Big Bang, because there was no time before the Big Bang.” Concepts around black holes, the Big Bang and singularities constitute just some of his legacy.

Rules don’t apply: Stephen Hawking’s theory of singularity is going to be trending in 2019

So let’s talk space-time singularity. It’s also known as gravitational singularity and refers to the centre of a black hole where density and gravity become infinite. So if you were to travel to the centre of a black hole — very daunting, yes — you’ll find space-time curves infinitely and the laws of physics, in which many of us seek comfort, cease to operate. Sounds scary, right?

Whether it’s popular culture or academia, society is surrounded by and mediated by more conversations around the impending apocalypse of the universe. If we mess around enough with the universe, we could very well send basically all matter around and including us into this very small space.

In academia

According to one of Hawking’s last papers ‘A smooth exit from eternal inflation?’ published in April 2018, time will also cease to exist in a paradigm of singularity. Think of a power switch fusing uncontrollably and sending infinite sparks through a household to the point even the best electrician wouldn’t meddle with anything.

In pop culture

If you speak Marvel, one may liken this concept to that of the Quantum Realm. In Guardians of the Galaxy, Taneleer Tivan or The Collector elaborates that there were six ‘singularities’ that existed before anything else, and were condensed into the Infinity Stones after the Big Bang. Essentially, the Quantum Realm is a place that is both sub-atomic and magical in some ways. So both the Infinity Stones and the Quantum Realm are all about particles, atoms, and the basic foundations of how things work in our universe.

Of course, we don’t have Infinity Stones... or do we?

Byte-sized play-by-plays of tech concepts