I've only had a couple of courses in quantum theory and quite frankly found Hawking's papers a bit over my head. At any rate, the top physicists in the world have no problem with it, but hey, if medved says different who am I to disagree.
Turns out, it's precisely some of the top physicists in the world who are having the big problems with it.
A prime example is the galaxy pair shown at the right. The larger galaxy (M51) in this pair of galaxies is obviously physically connected to its small companion galaxy. The redshift value of the small companion is vastly greater than the redshift of the larger (parent) galaxy. Mainstream astronomers presently are either ignoring this fact or denying that there is any physical connection between the larger and smaller members of the pair. They say the high redshift companion must be "well behind" its parent (because of this difference in their redshift values). That they are obviously physically connected is claimed to be an "illusion".Then there's the matter of the number of light-absorbing hydrogen clouds in front of each, a matter determined by the Lyman-Alpha forest in the spectra. Inevitably, the most red-shifted object has the greatest number of distinct hydrogen clouds in the way.