physicist passed away peacefully in a sleep in the early hours of wednesday hawking will be remembered for his groundbreaking work and black holes in general relativity he also defied expectations living for more than fifty years with a motor neuron disease let s take a look back at his life. stephen hawking showed the world the limitless possibilities of the mind trapped in a body crippled by illness he was one of the most well known scientists of our time from the seat of a wheelchair and with the help of a speech generating device the theoretical physicist and cosmologist fascinated people worldwide. talking faced his difficult physical condition with courage spirit and his trademark to drive. a superhero i worked on everything.