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| What do a fiction writer and an astrophysicist have in common? Marilynne Robinson and Marcelo Gleiser connect the dots between the cosmos, our minds, and all the ways we discover the story of where we came from (onbeing). |
Stephen Hawking has produced a “mind-bending” new theory that argues
black holes do not actually exist -- at least not in the way we currently perceive them.
Instead, in his paper, Information Preservation and Weather Forecasting for Black Holes, Hawking proposes that black holes can exist without “event horizons,” the invisible cover believed to surround every black hole.
Rude Prof. Hawking gets proof of black holes - Trisha Takanawa, Quahog News ("Family Guy")
During a previous lecture, “
Into the Black Hole,” Hawkins described an event horizon as the boundary of a black hole, “where gravity is just strong enough to drag light back, and prevent it escaping.”
“Falling through the event horizon, is a bit like going over Niagara Falls in a canoe,” he said. “If you are above the falls, you can get away if you paddle fast enough, but once you are over the edge, you are lost. There's no way back.
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| Fake Buddha quote (H.koppdelaney/flickr) |
“As you get nearer the falls, the current gets faster. This means it pulls harder on the front of the canoe, than the back. There's a danger that the canoe will be pulled apart. It is the same with black holes.”
But now Hawking is proposing “apparent horizons” could exist instead, which would only hold light and information temporarily before releasing them back into space in “garbled form,”
Nature has reported.
The internationally-renowned theoretical physicist suggests that quantum mechanics and general relativity remain intact, but black holes do not have an event horizon to catch fire.
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Look up, look up, and look out over the skies. It's what any eager astrophysicist would do, from the smoky skyline of New York to the chemtrail-laden skies of Los Angeles. From coast to coast, the host with the most is no longer Carl Sagan. Now the mantle is passed onto upstart Neil deGrasse Tyson, the telegenic Michio Kaku of all things space, a media darling who knows better than to step out of line and say anything daring or beyond the pale of the gatekeepers of academe. But he does a good job, and the kids will love to be drawn out of the misery down here into the mystery of worlds above. Minds may be expanded, but the status quo will not be questioned. Stephen Hawking and his new brain implant were not available to work on the show. Carl Sagan was, but the ChronoVision is not yet what it will one day be (just ask Andrew Basiago). As for "Cosmos," even Family Guy's Seth MacFarlane is on board, having brought the show to Fox TV. More (plus video)
