Slashdot Mirror
Hidden Black Holes Discovered
mknewman wrote to mention a Space.com article discussing the discovery of a large group of hidden black holes. From the article:"Black holes cannot be seen directly, because they trap light and anything else that gets too close. But astronomers infer their presence by noting the behavior of material nearby: gas is superheated and accelerated to a significant fraction of light-speed just before it is consumed. The activity releases X-rays that escape the black hole's clutches and reveal its presence. "
i heard its near uranus
lameness filter thwarted.
I get the general feeling, from the constant subtle posts about dark matter on Slashdot, that lot of the noise around dark matter is like that around snake oil = lots of profit. Yeah, way to solve the global energy problem! Whoever needs the first law of thermodynamics, when you can make all the perpetuum mobile you want, fueled by Dark Energy? I for one welcome the rigor and limit that science/nature puts on us. Practicing science is like practicing religion, you have to bow before Nature, instead of asserting your own will. Kings and fools are equal before its eyes. You can only get anywhere if you respect its limits, its laws. It's better than being completely free. You could argue whether the laws are fair or not, but that's a moot point, dumb, these laws are not like human erected laws, and laws dealing with the inner world, they are set, independently of you, and maybe you can't even comprehend them all, just get a glimmer, a glimpse - see, sparks of religious feeling even there. In fact you cannot disobey these laws, even if you tried to, I mean, you can try to, such as build perpetuum mobiles, but trying to do so is a futile excersize. You could approach this dark energy thing with a lot less greed, and a lot more wonder and love.