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Black Holes Don't Trap Information Forever

sciencehabit writes "New calculations suggest that black holes are not a one-way street. Anything that falls into them may eventually come out. The findings lend important support to quantum gravity, but fly in the face of Einsteinian relativity. They also support Stephen Hawking's reluctant admission that information couldn't be destroyed by black holes. Penn State researcher Ahbay Ashtekar was quoted saying, 'Once we realized that the notion of space-time as a continuum is only an approximation of reality, it became clear to us that singularities are merely artifacts of our insistence that space-time should be described as a continuum.' Let the physics infighting begin."

57 of 384 comments (clear)

  1. Oh great... by Cryacin · · Score: 5, Funny

    So I can't even wipe my drives by throwing them into a black hole?!? Grumble... (fires up microwave)

    --
    Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
    1. Re:Oh great... by Tanktalus · · Score: 4, Funny

      That was along my line of thought when seeing the title, except in reverse. I was thinking this was going to be a great way to store long-term backups.

    2. Re:Oh great... by ghstridr · · Score: 3, Funny

      So..........we may have interstellar bags of holding?

  2. Known for years by LeafOnTheWind · · Score: 5, Funny

    Once we realized that the notion of space-time as a continuum is only an approximation of reality, it became clear to us that singularities are merely artifacts of our insistence that space-time should be described as a continuum. I already discovered this during a wild acid trip 30 years ago. Man, the space time continuum is just an illusion - it's all about the singularities. When will The Man start listening and give me my Nobel Prize.
    1. Re:Known for years by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Funny

      I already discovered this during a wild acid trip 30 years ago. Man, the space time continuum is just an illusion - it's all about the singularities. When will The Man start listening and give me my Nobel Prize.

      Couldn't you just continue the trend and hallucinate the prize?
  3. Damn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    My patent on garbage disposal using blackholes is now worthless.

    1. Re:Damn by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

      My patent on garbage disposal using blackholes is now worthless.

      No, its worthless because you signed the patent application "Anonymous Coward".

  4. Re:pretty continua by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Its just that the simulator for this universe has a cell-size, so anything below a plank length is just being approximated to speed up the calculations.

  5. just can't wait by corbettw · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow, I can't wait to see how the writers of The Big Bang Theory will use this new theory to move Leonard's and Penny's love story along. Maybe Sheldon will make an oblique reference to it?

    --
    God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
  6. But does that mean... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does that mean that there's the slightest probability to unsee goatse and live a normal life again?

    1. Re:But does that mean... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      No, it might just be that one of those higher powers loves looking at goatse.

    2. Re:But does that mean... by Jesus_666 · · Score: 4, Funny

      An apocryphal text mentions this:

      And lo, the LORD appeared unto Moses and the LORD said thus: "Moses, I command you to look at this picture I found." And Moses looked at the picture and it was of a naked man doing unusual things to his behind. And a great unease came over Moses and he said: "My LORD, I beg you for a spoon to carve my eyes out with." And the LORD was greatly amused.

      --
      USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
  7. LHC by ViX44 · · Score: 5, Funny

    It is a pity that, after they fire up the Large Hadron Collider, we won't survive to hear Hawking's reluctant admission that tiny black holes don't evaporate.

    1. Re:LHC by Urkki · · Score: 2, Funny

      Shh! I'm trying to incite panic to get us of this rock!

      The real threats (asteroids and comets) don't seem do the trick, so it's time for much more improbable, but also oh so much more terrifying, painful and poetic threat of the Earth being devoured from under our feet by tiny black holes of our own making.

    2. Re:LHC by jamesh · · Score: 2, Funny

      In fact there is speculation that some particles we've noticed around the place are actually micro black holes and not elementary particles. There has been further speculation that all elementary particles are just micro black holes anyway.

      There has also been speculation that the universe is just tiny curled up pieces of string too... but nobody listens to that nonsense.

  8. $100 on Hawking! by urcreepyneighbor · · Score: 2, Funny

    Let the physics infighting begin. I dare you to tell me Hawking doesn't secretly control a robot army!

    Also, $100 on Kaku. I don't know why, but I suspect he knows jujutsu....
    --
    "The fight for freedom has only just begun." - Geert Wilders
  9. Re:pretty continua by Anne_Nonymous · · Score: 4, Funny

    >> Couldn't quantisation just be an artifact of a closed universe i.e. standing wave modes in a finitely sized continuum ?

    Yes, however, I think the more critical questions are:

    Who put the bomp in the bomp bah bomp bah bomp?
    Who put the ram in the rama lama ding dong?
    Who put the bop in the bop shoo bop shoo bop?
    Who put the dip in the dip da dip da dip?

  10. thermo by Lord+Ender · · Score: 3, Funny

    Let me propose the newest addition to the laws of thermodynamics:

    Information can not be destroyed.

    --
    A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
    1. Re:thermo by DanWS6 · · Score: 4, Funny

      The Bush administration is going to go ape shit over this. :D

  11. Re:ridiculous by Stormwatch · · Score: 5, Funny

    Time has never reversed or looped or anything crazy like that before so why would it now?
    How the hell would you know if it did?
    Oh, come on, anyone would notice...
    ...eciton dluow enoyna ,no emoc ,hO

    ?did ti fi wonk uoy dluow lleh eht woH

    ?won ti dluow yhw os erofeb taht ekil yzarc gnihtyna ro depool ro desrever reven sah emiT
  12. Re:ridiculous by complete+loony · · Score: 5, Funny

    How the hell would you know if it did? How the hell would you know if it did?
    --
    09F91102 no, 455FE104 nope, F190A1E8 uh-uh, 7A5F8A09 that's not it, C87294CE no. Ah! 452F6E403CDF10714E41DFAA257D313F.
  13. More diabolical than that by symbolset · · Score: 5, Funny

    The quantum unit of information is a "ficton".

    The rest of the jokes write themselves.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
    1. Re:More diabolical than that by Vectronic · · Score: 4, Funny

      is a bit what?... damnit man, finish your sentences! /kidding

    2. Re:More diabolical than that by sm62704 · · Score: 2, Funny

      The rest of the jokes write themselves.

      No, all the jokes write themselves. Except the one about black holes. As TFA says, information can escape from a black hole, but after getting out of one of the damned things it's way too tired to talk and besides, it has a headache right now.

      --
      mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
  14. Go back? by myrdred · · Score: 4, Funny

    So, then, once you go black... you can go back?

  15. At last! Someone seeks my work! by fireboy1919 · · Score: 5, Funny

    In 1687, Isaac Newton wrote is Principia, which defined about half of calculus, and all of Newtonian physics - defining laws of both gravity, and inertia. It is understandable, then with no understanding of quantum mechanics at all, that he did not explicitly mention quantum monkeys at all.

    Maxwell then went on to explain Ether as a medium through which light traveled in 1878, later being disproved in 1881 by Michelson, and laying the groundwork for the discovery of quantum monkeys though the discovery of constant velocity light.

    This was established as mathematically sound in Einstein's theory of special relativity in 1905. General relativity, which explained gravitational effects on light and particles/waves moving fractionally close to the speed of light, was finally established in 1915 by Hilbert and Einstein, surprisingly without mention of quantum monkeys, despite all indications.

    Because of this work, as well as the basics of quantum mechanics established by Einstein, various scientists were able to find the six quarks: Up, Down, Top, Bottom, Charmed and Strange, the last (top) only having been confirmed in a laboratory in 1995. Strangely, however, none of the various experiments which identified quarks also identified quantum monkeys, which would have been readily observable through their quantum-picking-fleas-off-other-quantum-monkey gatherings.

    The first of these discoveries, in the early 1960s made possible a formalization of a unified model in 1970-73 of four fundamental forces, three of which can be unified mathematically under one theory and with particles that are at least indirectly observable (electromagnetic, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear), and a fourth which doesn't quite fit (gravity). Despite these obvious problems, no one started looking at the quantum banana-eating by quantum monkeys as a possible unifying factor.

    To establish a unified theory including gravity, scientists are currently using strings, rather than monkeys, as a unifying element. However, the majority of these theories are neither testable nor useful for the advancement of mankind. None of them so much as mention quantum poo, or postulate that quantum monkeys could have thrown it.

    To this day, the world waits for scientists start to seek out the quantum monkeys that have so long waited for proper credit to be given to them for unifying quantum forces. So we wait still, a working unified theory still out of our grasp.

    --
    Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
  16. Einstein's Letter by Twigmon · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...but fly in the face of Einsteinian relativity.

    Sounds like God is a little grumpy about Einstein's letter coming out.

  17. CHUCK NORRIS by ClioCJS · · Score: 5, Funny
    Chuck Norris gets information from black holes just by looking at them.

    and the event horizon of Chuck Norris is infinity.

    --
    -Clio
    Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
    Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
    1. Re:CHUCK NORRIS by servognome · · Score: 1, Funny

      Black holes are the result of stars that are hit by a Chuck Norris roundhouse kick.

      --
      D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
  18. Horaaaay! by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Funny

    That means I'm gonna get my missing-paired socks back!

  19. Re:pretty continua by timeOday · · Score: 4, Funny

    Continua are so much prettier mathematically though
    I can see you're not a computer scientist! Give me finite discrete quantities any day :)
  20. Groundhole Day by Tablizer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Does that mean that there's the slightest probability to unsee goatse and live a normal life again?

    Then we could relive the sinister joy of exposing you to it for the first time over and over.

  21. Re:Yet another approximation of reality by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    First I learn Newton is only an approximation...now even Einstein...is only an approximation as well. Will the real reality please reveal itself!

    Here ya go

  22. Re:No by zapakh · · Score: 3, Funny

    So... it's a Planck-truth?

  23. Re:pretty continua by William+Robinson · · Score: 5, Funny
    Single answer.

    It's turtles all the way down :)

  24. Re:pretty continua by MadnessASAP · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hah! That pretty much describes all the science classes I've ever taken. First day of class always went something like this "Just kidding all that hard work you did was actually pointless. This is hows the universe "actually" works. *snicker*"

    --
    I may agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to face the consequences of saying it.
  25. So it IS possible... by phagstrom · · Score: 5, Funny

    I can get the information back from /dev/null. My compression scheme does work. Time to take over the world!

  26. wrong by goombah99 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Its just that the simulator for this universe has a cell-size, so anything below a plank length is just being approximated to speed up the calculations. No they tried that and if failed. It turned out that really the simulations of our world are being done in a 6 dimensional world. Since it's six dimensional it's not really a burden on their computers. FOr example, if you lived on a 2-d plane of finite size and tried to simulate another 2-d world, you'd end up like you say having to make the simulation smaller than the world it lives in and hence cell-size effects would pop up and you'd consume a good fraction of all the resources in your 2-d world to represent another 2-d world.

    But if you live in a 3-d world then having a bunch of 2-d simmulations is like have a ream of paper. 500 sheets of paper stack up nicely and consume very little of our 3-d world.

    in 6-d our 3-d world is a trivial piece of it and computers can easily simmulate it.

    No the problem is that there's not an algebraic solution to any polynomial greater than fifth order. Thus they wind up having to numerically approximate the mappings from 6D and this has round off errors from the finite bit floating point representation in Exel 6D.

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    1. Re:wrong by EdIII · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'll admit it. That stuff is so far over my head I can't tell if you are insightful or funny. I feel like the 2 year old little child laughing with his parents even though he has no understanding of what is going on. Speaking of that, I have to go poopie.

    2. Re:wrong by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

      I'll admit it. That stuff is so far over my head I can't tell if you are insightful or funny. I feel like the 2 year old little child laughing with his parents even though he has no understanding of what is going on. Speaking of that, I have to go poopie.

      And to think we almost made it through a Slashdot thread on black holes without a scat pr0n reference :)

  27. Re:pretty continua by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    This too will be shown to just be an approximation which doesn't actually reflect how the universe works. That's all physics is in the end.

    +0.99999997387120382 Insightful

  28. Re:pretty continua by debatem1 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Ok- mind representing one hundred duotrigintillion * 2^32,582,657-1 for me real quick? Thanks ;)

  29. Re:Come out again?! by jandersen · · Score: 4, Funny

    What they mean, obviously, is that the information is released once the copyright runs out.

  30. Tags by azuredrake · · Score: 2, Funny

    Due to the researcher's quote, I move this story be tagged "thereisnospoon" . Join me! :)

    --
    Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
  31. Re:Come out again?! by Tenebrousedge · · Score: 3, Funny

    That's sarcasm, dammit! Or humor. Irony is someone being pedantic and critical on slashdot in response to a minor misuse of language.

    Wait...nevermind...

    --
    Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
  32. Re:pretty continua by zeromorph · · Score: 4, Funny

    +0.99999997387120382 Insightful

    according to the accuracy of measurement

    --
    "Hannibal's plans never work right. They just work." Amy/A-Team
  33. Re:Come out again?! by mazarin5 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Irony is someone being pedantic and critical on slashdot in response to a minor misuse of language. No, no, no, irony is someone being pedantic and critical on slashdot in response to a minor misuse of language and being wrong.

    --
    Fnord.
  34. so that's called... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    walking the plank?

  35. Re:Come out again?! by coolGuyZak · · Score: 4, Funny

    No, irony is ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife.

  36. Re:pretty continua by sm62704 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Understanding the entire universe is kind of like knowing every human being that ever lived and will be born, except that every human being that ever lived and will ever be born are only a teeny tiny fraction of one of the infinite number of planets in the universe itself.

    --
    mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
  37. Re:pretty continua by skeeto · · Score: 3, Funny

    This too will be shown to just be an approximation which doesn't actually reflect how the universe works. That's all physics is in the end. +0.99999997387120382 Insightful

    So the universe isn't so complex after all: it simply runs on a Pentium.

  38. Re:pretty continua by mikiN · · Score: 2, Funny

    (proposition of formula describing the structure of the Universe)

    "I have a truly marvelous proof of this proposition which this text box is too narrow to contain."

    --
    The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
  39. Re:pretty continua by sm62704 · · Score: 3, Funny

    He used a Pentium computer. Running Windows.

    --
    mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
  40. Re:pretty continua by Walt+Dismal · · Score: 5, Funny
    I've always wondered about the following:

    if two particles are quantum-entangled, and you separate them, they remain entangled and you can monitor the state of one using the other. (Although I never understood what happens when one particle is accelerated to near light speed: how do two particles on different time scales stay connected?)

    So now drop one particle of the pair into a black hole.

    If they remain entangled, then you clearly have a way to pass information out of the black hole (although time may be stretched so it's not instantaneous anymore). This breaks known physics.

    If their entanglement is broken off, then it means the gravitation boundary of a black hole trumps quantum entanglement. But that breaks known physics.

    I'll take questions from the audience now. Yes, Dr Kip Thorne?

    Thorne: You bastard.

  41. Re:pretty continua by timeOday · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think you just did!

  42. Re:Endless difficulties by somersault · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think it's time for science to step up and say something about how we live our lives and structure our societies, however, the obstacles are immense. Scientist: Uh, hi.

    Totally hawt babe: Hi! What's up?

    Scientist: Uh.. I have the results of our latest cultural analysis.

    Totally hawt babe: Yeah that's why I'm here! What's next for me?

    Scientist: Well.. we have to have a one night stand. Possibly two nights, the data is currently a bit unclear.

    Totally hawt babe: Let me see that!

    Scientist: You know that's against the rules! Security! Take this woman to my living quarters!
    --
    which is totally what she said
  43. Re:pretty continua by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    At a ballgame recently, everyone was doing the Wave except for one group of physicists. They were doing the Particle.