Timeless

At 21, many believe their life is just beginning. But at that tender age in 1963, Stephen Hawking received terrible news. He was diagnosed with a rare motor neurone disease, and doctors gave him two years to live. In the end, he defied their expectations by 53 years - becoming one of the world's most celebrated scientists in the process. He died yesterday aged 76.

During his life he achieved many things, producing pioneering research on black holes and cosmologyThe science of the origin and development of the universe..

Yet all the while he battled his terrible disease which put him in a wheelchair and robbed him of his speech.

It also gave him great difficulty writing, yet it was a book, A Brief History of Time, that secured his stardom. Spending 237 weeks on the Sunday Times bestseller list and translated into 40 languages, it introduced a mass audience to the most fundamental questions about the universe.

But through all his triumphs and tribulations, he was also a husband and a father to three children. And as news of his death broke his children released a statement quoting one of their father's thoughts: "He once said: 'It would not be much of a universe if it wasn't home to the people you love.'"

What can we learn from the remarkable life of Stephen Hawking?

His life is about triumph over adversity, some argue. Hawking's achievements stand alone. But that he did all those things while fighting a crippling disability is the true triumph. It shows that we can all overcome the direst circumstances if we only believe we can.

It is more subtle than that, others say. It is not that he overcame difficulty, but that adversity made him who he was - spurring him on to make the best of the time he had. The message is not that any hardship can be defeated, but that even the worst circumstances can produce wonderful things.