In Stephen Hawking’s forthcoming book, The Grand Design (co-written with American physicist Leonard Mlodinow), he says:
Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the Universe exists, why we exist… It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the Universe going.
So, how can something come from nothing? Laws of science, such as gravity, are something — not nothing — so where do they come from? How are they sustained? Maybe he answers this in the book?
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In the past, Hawking didn’t dismiss the possibility of a Creator, but in this new book, he rejects Newton’s theory that the Universe was set in motion by God. Hawking also said in June that he doesn’t believe a personal God exists:
The question is: is the way the universe began chosen by God for reasons we can’t understand, or was it determined by a law of science? I believe the second. If you like, you can call the laws of science ‘God’, but it wouldn’t be a personal God that you could meet, and ask questions.