Questions about Hawking radiation and extremal black holes...?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the properties of extremal black holes and their relationship to Hawking radiation and black hole evaporation. Participants explore theoretical conditions under which black holes might avoid evaporation, including the implications of extremal black holes and the role of different spacetime geometries.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Technical explanation

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants propose that extremal black holes, having a Hawking temperature of 0K, might avoid evaporation, raising questions about their physical possibility and implications for the 3rd law of thermodynamics.
  • Others argue that nearly-extremal black holes would still emit some Hawking radiation, potentially leading to inevitable evaporation.
  • One participant suggests that placing a black hole in Anti-de Sitter (AdS) space could prevent evaporation due to reflecting boundary conditions, allowing the black hole to reach thermal equilibrium with the surrounding radiation.
  • Another participant questions whether the AdS scenario could be applied to de Sitter (dS) spacetimes, which may be relevant to the current state of the universe.
  • It is noted that both classical and semiclassical gravity theories predict the impossibility of extremal black holes in accordance with the 3rd law of black hole thermodynamics.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express differing views on the possibility of black holes avoiding evaporation, with some suggesting that extremal black holes might not exist while others explore conditions under which black holes could theoretically avoid evaporation. The discussion remains unresolved regarding the physical reality of extremal black holes and their implications.

Contextual Notes

The discussion highlights limitations in current understanding, including the lack of a complete theory of black hole evaporation and the dependence on theoretical models that may not be fully validated.

Suekdccia
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TL;DR
Are extremal black holes thermodynamically impossible for having a 0 Hawking temperature?
I'm studying if there is some way to avoid black hole evaporation, even if it requires a very special set up of conditions...

Theoretically, extremal black holes (both for rotating Kerr and Reissner-Nordström ones) would avoid evaporation as they would not emit Hawking radiation. Since perfectly extremal black holes would have a Hawking temperature of 0K, this presumably would violate the 3rd law of thermodynamics.

Then, are extremal black holes physically impossible?

Would nearly-extremal black holes avoid somehow evaporation? Or would they emit a small amount of Hawking radiation that would make them evaporate inevitably?

Can there be any way in which black holes avoid being evaporated? Or is it utterly inevitable?
 
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Suekdccia said:
Can there be any way in which black holes avoid being evaporated? Or is it utterly inevitable?
Since we don't even have a full theory of black hole evaporation (all we have are approximate models that might or might not be correct), and since we have no evidence about it and aren't likely to get any any time soon, this question is not answerable. The best we can say is that this is still an open area of research.
 
Are you specifically interested in black holes that don't evaporate, or black holes that don't emit any Hawking radiation? If it's the former then you can just put the black hole in AdS. If it's a large black hole (i.e. above the typical AdS length scale) then it won't evaporate because of the reflecting boundary conditions at infinity. The black hole will reach thermal equilibrium with the bath of Hawking radiation.

A non-extremal black hole will always emit Hawking radiation though, because of the non-zero temperature.
 
OlderWannabeNewton said:
A non-extremal black hole will always emit Hawking radiation though, because of the non-zero temperature.
I see. And would extremal black holes be impossible for their 0K temperature?

Also, would the AdS scenario that you described also work for dS spacetimes (which our universe is approaching into)?
 
Last edited:
Both classical and semiclassical gravity predict that they are impossible by the 3rd law of black hole thermodynamics.
 

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