16
Thursday, August 30, 2012
2012 London Paralympic Games is ON Stephen Hawking. Hawking, author of the best-selling "A Brief History of Time" who has motor neuron disease and has been
LONDON (AFP) - Queen Elizabeth II on Wednesday officially opened the London Paralympics, at a showpiece ceremony aimed at challenging perceptions about disability and championing the human spirit. The 86-year-old monarch declared the Games open in a short speech in the traditional curtain-raiser to 11 days of sporting action at an event involving over 3,000 performers preceded by a spectacular flypast by a disabled pilot. London 2012 chief Sebastian Coe said he hoped the Games "would be a landmark for people with a disability everywhere, a landmark in the progress of mankind towards the light, towards seeing im-
mense capability and possibility". The president of the Inter-
ory on the creation of the universe about which he has written extensively, to the 18th century "Enlightment" period and scientific discoveries of
of the human spirit" that had "the energy to change each and every one of us".
Voyage of discovery: The exploits of man adventures to the moon featured in the opening ceremony as the audience were guided through the wonders of the cosmos by Stephen Hawking.
national Paralympic Committee, Philip Craven, added that the Games were "a celebration
The show began with a rare public appearance by Britain's most famous living scientist,
paralysed most of his life, was described by organisers as "the most famous disabled person anywhere on the planet". He guided a central character on a journey of discovery in a story inspired by William Shakespeare's "The Tempest", taking in the "Big Bang" the-
the modern era. "We live in a universe governed by rational laws that we can discover and understand," the 70-year-old theoretical physicist said through his voice-synthesised computer. continues on page 15