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Stephen Hawking: Human race is in danger, and it's our fault
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   Mary Bowerman   | USA TODAY Network
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   Stephen Hawking: The human race is in danger, and it's our own fault
   The physicist says he believes humanity will face dangerous scenarios
   of our own making during the next century, including nuclear war.
   Newslook

   Science superstar Stephen Hawking says humanity is inching closer to
   demise, and we are to blame.

   The physicist made the comments during the annual BBC Reith lecture,
   and said it’s inevitable that in the next “thousand or ten thousand
   years,” a disaster will strike the planet.

   "By that time we should have spread out into space, and to other stars,
   so a disaster on Earth would not mean the end of the human race,” he
   said during the BBC lecture.

   Hawking cautioned that disasters engineered by humans, including
   climate change, nuclear war and genetically engineered viruses, could
   be the downfall of life as we know it on Earth. With advancements in
   technology come "new ways things can go wrong," Hawking said.

   "However, we will not establish self-sustaining colonies in space for
   at least the next hundred years, so we have to be very careful in this
   period," Hawking said.

   Hawking was diagnosed with a motor neuron disease when he was 21, and
   has been confined to a wheelchair for decades. The world-renowned
   scientist communicates with the help of a speech synthesizer.

   This isn’t the first time that Hawking has voiced concern. In the past,
   he warned that artificial intelligence could wipe out the human race.

   Despite the threat of impending disaster, Hawking’s says people will
   continue to be resourceful.

   "We are not going to stop making progress, or reverse it, so we have to
   recognize the dangers and control them. I'm an optimist, and I believe
   we can,"  he said.

   Follow @MaryBowerman on Twitter.
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