Black holes: properties, formation, and observational evidence

Black Holes

Scientific debate has been one of the strongest threads of reality in the U.S. And elsewhere for a very long time. Many scientists, especially physicists and astronomers have known of the existence of the Black Hole for a long time and yet to now have been entirely unsure as to how to define and describe it to the modern scientific and lay communities in such a way that they ca understand the nature of its danger and also how it is kept in check by the universe. There have been countless theories about the nature and danger of black holes, and these ideas began almost since the discovery of these black mysteries in the universe. One such mystery is Stephen Hawking's assertion that in the center of a black hole there is the formation of a mini solar system and that the black hole will suck up anything in its vicinity, including information. More recently Hawking has admitted err, to the sadness of many science fiction buffs and stated that only mass will flow through a black hole, and in so doing it will be scrambled beyond recognition. (Murphy, 2004, p. 195)

Currently, the trend has been not to try to completely describe the entity known as a black hole but to describe it in a collective where the individual can see the connectivity between it and the objects and systems surrounding it and better understand how the system works in balance, and only makes extreme changes over extremely long periods of time. This was the intention of Tucker, Tananbaum & Fabian in their 2007 Scientific American article describing the broader universe as a large scale system that would resemble a broad road map. According to the authors, at the center of what can only be described as a giant bubble the apex of this large scale system is its creator, not its source of destruction, the black hole which they actually describe as not a black hole as we understand it but a massive and dynamic galaxy. (pp 42-49) According to Tucker, Tananbaum & Fabian, who have used compilations of information from extra-atmospheric observation tools to come up with a comprehensive view of the universe the average black hole can only effect an entire galaxy cluster in the way that a cluster of blueberries might effect the entire earth. The authors contend that contrary to previous ideas associated with the destructive nature of black holes, in reality they and the other material objects in the grand system have reached a kind of equilibrium that includes massive changes but only on a long standing time clock, one that is almost inconceivable to humanity because of its sheer size, as well as the extreme lengths of time it takes for the light information to reach the earth. (p. 44) the massive nature of the energy that are produced and dealt with, within these formations is also challenging to comprehend, even for the scientists who normally deal in macro information. The dynamic nature of the black hole, is one of balance, both creative and destructive power often exceeding comprehension but in a balanced system.

Black holes are not just cosmic sinkholes; they are also motors that can transform rotational motion into linear motion. The infalling material transfers its spin to the hole, causing its outer boundary to move near the speed of light. Then the magnetic field of the hole funnels some of the inflalling material into outward jets. A rapidly spinning hole can shoot out one unit of gas for every three it swallows. (p. 47)

There is a clear sense that for some time the old standards of understanding, regarding dynamic and almost instantaneous creation are being challenged by scientific fact as well as the common enigmas associated with early ideas about big bangs and complete matter upheaval and reformation.

The major weakness of the original big-bang cosmology was its inability to account for the fact that at 10-43 of a second after the origin of the entire Universe, the balance between the expansionary force of creation and the contractive force of gravity had to be infinitesimally fine. In other words, there had to be just enough matter to hold the Universe together in dynamic equilibrium. It must have started out with exactly this critical density in order for it to be, in cosmological terms, so close to the critical density today. This critical balance between expansion and contraction must have been to an accuracy of 1 part in 1060 that is, 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000. Without such a fine balance, the Universe would long ago have collapsed into a black hole or expanded to such an extent that it would now be virtually empty. (Hawkins, 1998, p. 16)

The challenges to the big bang and other dynamic creation stories is that the universe and the systems that make it up are much more gradual in formation and developed and perpetuated by a system of checks and balances that in many ways defy understanding. Quasars, which can most easily be described as the light patterns emitted from a disappearing mass into a black hole, the lights itself being a clue and an enigma, given the length of time ti takes to reach an earth bound observer;

Our current picture of quasars is actually quite complicated. In the center of a galaxy lies a massive black hole containing around 100 million Sun's worth of matter. This black hole forms at the center of a vortex or whirlpool of matter spiraling inward. Surrounding matter is drawn into this accretion disk where it is accelerated to extremely high speeds before disappearing into the black hole and losing all contact with our Universe. During the final moments before crossing the event horizon, when traveling very close to the speed of light, the matter can emit as much as half of its mass in the form of electromagnetic and other radiation, the whole way across the spectrum from microwaves, through the optical and ultraviolet, to X-rays and gamma rays. Enveloping the accretion disk are clouds of gas which are stimulated to shine, rather like fluorescent lights, by the intense energy pouring out from the center. The picture is completed by two opposing jets of electrically conducting gas or "plasma" ejected from the center, perpendicular to the disk. The entire accretion disk system is smaller than our Solar System, and so can vary on timescales of a few months, as required by the observations. (Hawkins, 1998, p. 80)

The foundation of such ideas are again based on light observation and in this sense they are a significant source of information as well as a clear demonstrative check, as these patterns are the only, "proof' we have of the existence of the system as a whole.

When a massive galaxy lies along our line of sight to a compact light source such as a quasar, the gravitational field of the galaxy bends the quasar's light rather in the manner of a glass lens. The effect on the quasar is typically to split its image so that one sees two quasars separated on the sky by a few seconds of arc, and differing only in their apparent brightness. Now, if the quasar varies in luminosity, for example if it gives off a flare, this will be seen in both images but not necessarily at the same time. The two sets of light rays from the quasar follow different paths through the Universe to the observer, and typically these paths will not be the same length. Thus one might observe the flare in one image several months before it is seen in the other. Given that we know the speed of light, the time difference between the two detections gives us the difference in the path lengths, which in turn gives a direct measure of the Hubble constant.