Black Holes: Is Super Dense Matter a Better Explanation?

[bikeaddict]

You know how all those science channel specials on black holes, they depict a black hole as a funnel in space that sucks everything into another universe.

Wouldn't super dense matter do the same thing? not let anything escape, even light? Wouldnt that be a better explanation?

 

[berkeman]

A black hole is super-dense matter.

 

[DaveC426913]

You know how all those science channel specials on black holes, they depict a black hole as a funnel in space that sucks everything into another universe.

"Real" science shows - ones that aren't sensationalizing - will not make unfounded speculations about matter getting sucked into other universes.

Black holes are not "holes" at all, they are simply matter that has collapsed in on itself. The matter is still there, just in a form we don't understand.

Note that if you add mass to a black hole, its gravitational field grows - direct evidence that the matter is still there.

 

[bikeaddict]

They should be renamed Black Balls then, right? Let's start a trend.

A black hole is super-dense matter.

 

[moe darklight]

They should be renamed Black Balls then, right?

I can only imagine trying to teach a class full of kids about "massive black balls" "balls so massive, not even light can escape!" ... I think museum workers and science teachers have enough trouble with "Homo Erectus" as it is.

... and I bet they'd be glad the universe isn't blue

the picture of the funnel is just an analogy of the gravity. To demonstrate how strong it gets as it gets nearer and nearer whatever the heck is in the center. so it's not just out of the blue.

 

[bikeaddict]

I can only imagine trying to teach a class full of kids about "massive black balls" "balls so massive, not even light can escape!" ... I think museum workers and science teachers have enough trouble with "Homo Erectus" as it is.

That is TOO FUNNY!

 

[neutrino]

They should be renamed Black Balls then, right? Let's start a trend.

Incidentally, they have just been renamed as http://www.dailyredundancy.com/archives/1018.html .

(via http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2007/06/22/black-holes-even-the-name-sucks/)

 

[bikeaddict]

Well its nice to know I'm on the right track. Total layman here.

 

[JesseM]

You know how all those science channel specials on black holes, they depict a black hole as a funnel in space that sucks everything into another universe.

Wouldn't super dense matter do the same thing? not let anything escape, even light? Wouldnt that be a better explanation?

According to Einstein's theory of general relativity, once the matter has collapsed to a sufficiently small size, it will inevitably collapse further into a single point with zero size and infinite density--a "singularity". Physicists think that at sufficiently small scales quantum effects may cause general relativity's predictions to become significantly incorrect, but the scale where it's expected to break down is extremely tiny, so even if the matter does not collapse to a mathematical point it is probably compressed down to something on the scale of the Planck density, which for a black hole formed from a star would be much smaller than a single proton.