What happens once something collapses into a black hole?

Hawking's latest theory seems to rule out using black holes as time machines or as gateways to other universes.

Physics' base is the understanding that matter never really 'goes away' but, rather, is re-distributed in another form of energy. This is a key law of physics that scientists had relied on for years....that may not be true anymore.

If all information about the collapsing matter is lost, it defies the laws of quantum physics. Yet, in current thinking, once the matter goes over the event horizon and forms a black hole, all information about it is lost.

Ok, so just recently Steven Hawking proposed a new theory, the theory that any information(matter) within a black hole is gone forever. In other words, upon the 'death' or ''downtime' of a black holes activity, black holes have been known to feed voraciously then suddenly, without warning, stop feeding, scientists have always assumed that matter was somehow re-directed or otherwise used in some way but certainly not gone.

Large jets of gas from visible feeding giants will inexplicably stop, where is all the information the black hole had been consuming? Well apparently all that information somehow just disappears with the black hole, this has scientists utterly confused as it does not adhere to the base law of physics.

Does anyone have any thoughts as to why this happens or where it may go?

Its worth discussing as they have just confirmed the existence of black holes in EVERY single galaxy studied...this means that we too have one here in our very own Milky Way(as observed by researchers viewing a set of stars moving at extreme speeds around the perimeter of a Hole not far from us.) apparently black holes are necessary to the life of a galaxy.

So, we have a star a fraction of the size of our sun with 5 times the density in mass, where does all this matter go? How is this possible? We know matter is never 'really' gone or is it? If proven this will rock the scientific world and we will have to redefine physical laws. The dawn of a new understanding in science is on the horizon and who knows what it holds.

Stephen Hawking has put forward a new theory that changes the way scientists view black holes, saying he was wrong about them in the past.

The physicist told a conference on gravitation in Dublin that he has revised his belief that black holes destroy everything that falls on them.

He now believes that black holes may allow information to get out.

His new research could even help solve the "black hole information paradox", a crucial puzzle for modern physics.

He is revising his 1975 ideas that are regarded as the most astonishing breakthrough in black hole studies.

A black hole is an object from which once inside it is not possible to escape. Its boundary is called its "event horizon".

But now Hawking believes that it might not be a one-way trip after all.

In 1975, Hawking calculated that once a black hole forms, it radiates energy and starts losing mass by giving off "Hawking radiation".

Scientists were astounded because Hawking's work on a mathematical description of the ever-shrinking black hole forged a link between gravity and entropy - a measure of how energy changes from one form to another.

It was said that black holes had no hair, meaning that it did not matter what came together to make them.

For years, the physicist argued that the extreme gravitational fields of black holes somehow overturned the quantum laws. Now, he has dropped this idea.

Professor Hawking's new black holes never completely destroy everything that falls in. Instead, they continue to emit radiation for extended periods, and eventually open up to reveal the information within them.

Hawking presented his new position to a packed lecture hall
Stephen Hawking has put forward a new theory that changes the way scientists view black holes, saying he was wrong about them in the past.

The physicist told a conference on gravitation in Dublin that he has revised his belief that black holes destroy everything that falls on them.

He now believes that black holes may allow information to get out.

His new research could even help solve the "black hole information paradox", a crucial puzzle for modern physics.

He spoke to a packed lecture hall at the 17th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation, giving his new views in a presentation entitled The Information Paradox For Black Holes.

A black hole is an object from which once inside it is not possible to escape. Its boundary is called its "event horizon".

But now Hawking believes that it might not be a one-way trip after all.
For years, the physicist argued that the extreme gravitational fields of black holes somehow overturned the quantum laws. Now, he has dropped this idea.

Professor Hawking's new black holes never completely destroy everything that falls in. Instead, they continue to emit radiation for extended periods, and eventually open up to reveal the information within them.

"I have been thinking about this problem for 30 years, but I now have an answer to it," he explained.

"The black hole only appears to form but later opens up and releases information about what fell in, so we can be sure of the past and we can predict the future."

Gary Gibbons, a physicist at Cambridge University, said Hawking's newly defined black holes did not have a well-delineated event horizon that hid everything in them from the outside Universe.

Kip Thorne, a leading cosmologist from the California Institute of Technology said of Hawking's new idea: "This looks to me on the face of it to be a lovely argument, but I haven't yet seen all the details".

In 1975, Hawking calculated that once a black hole forms, it radiates energy and starts losing mass by giving off "Hawking radiation".

Scientists were astounded because Hawking's work on a mathematical description of the ever-shrinking black hole forged a link between gravity and entropy - a measure of how energy changes from one form to another.

It was said that black holes had no hair, meaning that it did not matter what came together to make them.

All a black hole had was mass, charge, and spin. There was no information about matter inside the black hole, and once the hole disappeared, all the information went with it.

For all those that missed it:

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3913145.stm

reply to post by watch_the_rocks


ya how cool is that? this is big.

The problem for black holes is that astrophysicists generall agree that they're 'likely' and perhaps probable. They'll be hard to find being black against a black background if they do, in fact, exist. Current plasma theory doesn't require exotic things like black holes to make the universe work so it's early days as yet.

I imagine the gravity being high enough to compress matter down to the point where all atomic particles are being crushed together as a single mass with no space between them so anything entering such an environment would lose its individuality without losing any mass. Kind of the opposite of a plasma where matter is excited sufficiently to drive atomic particles apart so that individual elements no longer exist in it (sea of protons, neutrons, electrons and whatever particles we've yet to identify)

But it's all just theoretical after all. The CERN LHC may just clear up the matter for us very soon.

Originally posted by Pilgrum


I imagine the gravity being high enough to compress matter down to the point where all atomic particles are being crushed together as a single mass with no space between them so anything entering such an environment would lose its individuality without losing any mass. Kind of the opposite of a plasma where matter is excited sufficiently to drive atomic particles apart so that individual elements no longer exist in it (sea of protons, neutrons, electrons and whatever particles we've yet to identify)

I have to agree. I believe that black holes do not take matter anywhere. The matter is still there in the same spot.(Unlike other theories where the matter is taken to another dimension) I believe it is just compressed to an unimaginable scale from the immense gravity. And i dont know if you ever heard of this but the theory that black holes "leak" matter wasnt first proposed by hawking. Ive read it before. Im not sure but i think it was in a book called "The Elegant Universe" by Brian Greene. Its overall about the Superstring theory but it describes black holes fairly well, and the theory that they leak matter over a period of time.

Originally posted by Pilgrum


But it's all just theoretical after all. The CERN LHC may just clear up the matter for us very soon.

Just a side note. Ive read about that and its also possible that when they use the Large Hadron Collider, there is a one in googol chance that it will implode the universe. Just thought id let you know. one googol= 10^100