Who's Afraid of a Big Black Hole

Who's Afraid of a Big Black Hole

2009, Science  -   62 Comments
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Ratings: 8.65/10 from 103 users.

Black holes are one of the most destructive forces in the universe, capable of tearing a planet apart and swallowing an entire star.

Yet scientists now believe they could hold the key to answering the ultimate question - what was there before the Big Bang?

The trouble is that researching them is next to impossible. Black holes are by definition invisible and there's no scientific theory able to explain them.

Despite these obvious obstacles, Horizon meets the astronomers attempting to image a black hole for the very first time and the theoretical physicists getting ever closer to unlocking their mysteries.

It's a story that takes us into the heart of a black hole and to the very edge of what we think we know about the universe.

Directed by: Stephen Cooter

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BOYA
BOYA
2 years ago

inside the BH particles are traveling at the speed of light and crashing into others which will create antimatter, this is how you get infinity and space is not empty not even close to it. There is all kinds of matter and just as many infinite types of particles. Just like there wasnt quantum mechanics before but there is now and we'll find the next smaller particles and the next.

Jay
Jay
3 years ago

So, in lay terms, a black hole is an imploding star where gravity is the only force left, this causes the mass to revert on itself until it becomes so tiny you can not measured, a singularity, but at the same time the force of gravity is such that not even light can escape . The Big Bang is the other side of a black hole, where we are right now, the quantum forces regaining power...and the process repeats like a yo-yo.

da Voce
da Voce
4 years ago

I remember when Einstein said universe was shaped like a donut. Everyone was working on donut math. OK

Roger
Roger
7 years ago

*charted.

Roger
Roger
7 years ago

Okay, I'm gonna need one, just one(1) physicist or astronomer to point to evidence of just one(1) star that had previously been seen and chatted but later been eaten by a black hole. Yeah. That would be great.

Gabbs
Gabbs
8 years ago

So....we are too wrapped up in trying to understand, that we truly refuse to recognize that things exists outside human comprehension. No time before time, no time before the Big Bang...only the human mind. All other animals just live. We are amazing.

deenibeeni
deenibeeni
8 years ago

My favorite line in this doc, spoken by an astrophysicist: "I can't deal with that number."

kompikos
kompikos
11 years ago

So, with a little imagination, it goes like this:

The cosmos is infinite. The Big Bang singularity is the same as the black hole singularity. When a star / system of stars / galaxy dies causing spacetime and mass to compress in a quantum level singularity (while creating a black hole in the process via super-bending spacetime), all this energy exist simultaneously in infinite number of places. These places are places within the universe where infinite singularities are ready to cause Big Bangs that could create infinite numbers of parallel universes (which exist theoretically according to Hawking). So black holes are indeed, in a sense, wormholes that connect parallel universes. We could also be living within a black hole as we speak, our whole known universe and never notice anything about it.

kcoll
kcoll
11 years ago

i have a question, if objects (fe l the sun) curve space time, does this mean that although the earth has an elliptical orbit, it is really traveling in a straight line, albeit in curved space time? love this stuff tho makes me feel real; small and in perspective, in the grand scheme of things.

fender24
fender24
11 years ago

I do not think Black Holes are that black. we dont know anything about it.

LLaqui
LLaqui
11 years ago

Amazing!

keving55
keving55
11 years ago

IF an aeroplane window fell out the air pressure would rush out if a star explodes causing a black hole the vacume of space gets sucked out,different vacumes,(pressures) all act the same until they equalize but do all black hole funnels meet on the other side of course they do and when the bins full and everything has been sucked down ----ANOTHER BING BANG and so on and so on

David Foster
David Foster
11 years ago

"there is no center, technically, or if you prefer, absolutely everywhere is exactly where the center of the BB is, from which the universe erupted"

hehe... That makes about as much logical sense as: "and God said 'Let There Be Light'"

Oh, and uh... "Everything is NOT moving away from everything else". The Milky Way is set to collide with Andromeda in about, oh, 3 billion years, or so.

Ya gotta love Google Scientists!

univerallyimprisoned
univerallyimprisoned
11 years ago

Hahaha your primitive attempts to predict the universe from a single location and point in time makes me chuckle deep like Satan looking up at us (not that Satan exists). Before one starts to even think big one must think small, I suggest you read up on a previously theorized particle that has been recently proven by nano particles on a circuit board attached to a semiconductor and a superconductor. The same particle thought to be the only one that acts as its own anti-particle. BB is a good Sunday school story but even with all the theory's your numbers still can’t back your misguided but encouraged efforts

Ammar Alrushaidan
Ammar Alrushaidan
11 years ago

Interesting thing. I can't Imagine how the scientists acheive this level of fact

Guest
Guest
11 years ago

@moderators...sorry guys i did it again, i corrected a typo on a comment that had gone to you because of an attached link and it sent it back to moderators again.
az

Guest
Guest
11 years ago

@Samuel Morrisey
If i imagine a BB, does the expansion go up and out like a nuclear bomb, forward in time like a gun shot or all directions at once from a center?
Where are we in that? Are we on the edge of an imagined expanding circle?
If from the earth we measure with our view to that far away dot, it is fair to say that that same distance exist on the other side of that dot.

With the Hublle telescope they claim to have gone back in space far enough to reach the noise of the BB. Quote: "Called the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, the view represents the deepest portrait of the visible universe ever achieved by humankind. The snapshot reveals the first galaxies to emerge from the so-called "dark ages," the time shortly after the big bang when the first stars reheated the cold, dark universe."

If that's the case then the universe is an expanding assembled cluster of particles. Then what is the space surrounding it? What is it expanding in or towards. And how do universes collapse together in such a situation?
May be the universe has to be contained for multiple universes to make sense otherwise they would simply merge.

I tend to think that this universe does not exist other than in our mind.

az

TJH1
TJH1
11 years ago

Right then if the bb did happen and space being space with no gravity of its own and that it's expanding all the time, Then logic says that in the area of the bb there MUST be a hell of a of an empty area wich is getting bigger why don't we look for that ?

Ovidiu Bledea
Ovidiu Bledea
11 years ago

I know how to process his data fast using that super computer or another one of those. This is exactly what neuro-fuzzy networks are for (non-linear problems). It is part of my engineering studies :) Would take a few years to? build, troubleshoot and train though.

Svetlana Vigliaturo
Svetlana Vigliaturo
11 years ago

My suggestions may be very amateurish and can raise a lot of LOL here, but I think, that the mistakes of the scientists lay in their attempts to disapprove Einstein’s theory instead of trying to find its limited but legal place in the explanation of the Universe. Every scientific theory, whether it is mechanical physics, or the theory of relativity or quantum physics, are just layers of one big theory of life, one big truth. So they all are valid within their limits, and their laws are working on their particular layers, therefore it does not mean that they are wrong or false. The other mistake, as I think, is that the scientists are trying to find the explanation of the Universe within particular layer, now within quantum physics, where laws of light can work only. But is there something beyond light, like, for example, black holes? A lot of hidden wisdom is contained in folk stories. You may ask any Russian kid who is familiar with old fairy tales, “What is the fastest in the world?”, and you may get an answer – “Thought!”, as this is what they say in those old stories. The theory of singularity, in which zero equal to eternity, where there is no time or distance existing, is absolutely true for a thought. This may explain telepathy, mindreading, ghosts, travelling in time and other “abnormality” happening in our life. The thought can expand to materialization and narrow to pure energy, it can be seen or measured in quantum physics and at the same time can clash all laws of it, as it goes beyond its limits. Could origin and the nature of human thought lead us to the whole truth?? I assume that if SOMEONE (theoretically) would be able to achieve the momentum of singularity in his life, similar to the black hole, the only laws existing there would be the law of his FREE WILL, which could give birth to a thought that can materialize into any creation (a monster or a masterpiece) “First came the word…” Does it mean under word actually “the thought”, as in the original script of the Bible it meant wider than just the word meaning… Only after that appeared darkness and light.

TJH1
TJH1
11 years ago

Thankyou for your replies and i do have a clearer understanig of what you mean, So much so i think i'll sit here till they hit the outer edge of the universe and bounce back ; ) And yes Sam i did read it all

drinker69
drinker69
11 years ago

Looks like Yoda the asian man does.

TJH1
TJH1
11 years ago

So if all the galaxies are moving away from our galaxy in wich direction are they going, And so we can map this to see where they started from which would be the center of the the big bang, or do we know already if so can you post it.

John Jacquard
John Jacquard
11 years ago

I find it interesting that science thinks that there is only the material, when clearly there was something before the big bang. the subset cannot define the superset.that space outside the ball of energy that would end up becoming our universe would have to be non-physical and non-materialistic since the physical and material cam after the big bang. a theory of everything must include this. how do we know we are not interacting with that outer layer from within the universe regarding such anomalous things like telepathy.

Scott Torola
Scott Torola
11 years ago

to summarize my last 2 entries. H 1.00794 moves through solid matter (against gravity ) in all proven experiments at near absolute zero.

Scott Torola
Scott Torola
11 years ago

with as little as i know, i know that matter as near 0 overlaps with itself. given the density of a black hole no matter the temp means matter can overlap upon itself.

Scott Torola
Scott Torola
11 years ago

Disclaimer: I know nothing about physics.

What if there is a upper limit to temperature or temp range where matter would act as if it would at near absolute zero at the density of black holes creating a massive bose einstein condensate?

To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.
Mark Twain

arifkarim
arifkarim
11 years ago

"what was there before the Big Bang?"
There is no such thing as time "before" the Big Bang because the nature of time as we know it didn't existed at the moment Big Bang event happened. Time itself is a byproduct of the Big Bang, same way as mass and space. Just so you know: Inside a Black hole the time is equal to 0. That very "Big" Black hole which resulted in the Big Bang "created" time in an evolutionary process. As long this expansion of space-time continues, WE experience time in only one direction. At that very moment space-time starts contracting back to the point where it all began: The Big Crunch may result in time reversal. Scientists don't know the true nature of that time in reverse because there is absolutely no way of knowing it until our universe hit the event of the Big Crunch, which is very unlikely as our current models of observation show. But there is no telling that it won't happen in the future because the Big Bang would never have occurred if it wasn't for the Big Crunch hitting previous universe(s) BEFORE our current universe!

David Ewer
David Ewer
11 years ago

Enjoyable although some stuff was a little dated. It would be nice to get an update on the black hole modelling project using multiple radiotelescopes.

KsDevil
KsDevil
11 years ago

Science can go on and on about something that is not understood and still remain relavent. The Universe is truly an enigma.

Matthew Criuis
Matthew Criuis
11 years ago

Oh no, not that crazy Michio Kaku again...