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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."

9 of 384 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Black holes - not hairy by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 5, Insightful

    But if information can escape a black hole, that cannot be true. The information must be in there, and must be itself a characteristic of the black hole.

  2. Yet another approximation of reality by martinX · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Great. First I learn Newton is only an approximation, atomic theory is only an approximation, Gas *laws* are an approximation and now even Einstein (who I can't understand anyway) is only an approximation as well.

    Will the real reality please reveal itself!

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  3. Re:pretty continua by Gerzel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Don't worry.

    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.

  4. No by symbolset · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well, actually, the quantum unit of information is a bit.

    No, the binary quantum unit of information is a bit. A ficton is several orders of magnitude "smaller" than that. A bit can be true or false. A light that's on or off. A ficton is a value that represents the smallest possible division of "possibly true". The universe is not binary at a very fine scale. Things fade in and out of frame with increasing and decreasing probability in the present moment. It's only when the arrow of entropy has passed and the frame is set that a thing was or was not, from our point of view.

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  5. Re:ridiculous by Urkki · · Score: 5, Insightful

    what do they mean not a continuum? Now we're gonna run out of time? No, they mean that time is not like a solid line, it is more like a dotted line, each dot being a moment in time.

    Or better analogy, time runs like a movie, but instead of 24 frames per second of an actual movie, real time runs about
    18550000000000000000000000000000000000000000 frames per second (1/Planck Time).

    And same goes for space. A HD movie on a nice TV might have 2000 pixels per meter. The space has something like 62500000000000000000000000000000000 "pixels" per meter (1/Planck Length).

    (Note to viewers: Things may appear distorted if viewed from great distance or if viewed from a very fast moving car. This is due to the effects of general relativity, and does not reflect the real quality of our production. We apologize for the inconvenience, and hope you will enjoy the show, no matter where you are watching this.)
  6. Re:pretty continua by GunFodder · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I suspect most physicists would rather believe that they are working towards a final description of the universe rather than just another step on an infinite progression.

    Asking a physicist if the universe is infinitely complex is like asking a salesman if his product is shoddy. They both have a vested interest in the answer.

  7. Re:thermo by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Information can not be destroyed.

    Or, in the language of the non-scientific, "God sees all, God knows everything, God is all powerful".

    Perhaps instead of condemning Christians for being unscientific, modern scientists, like Newton, should put more effort into understanding religious language!

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  8. After 42, s/science/engineering/g by tepples · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If eventually the universe was completely described, what use would there be for science? I can think of a use or forty-two...

    It would be good for one person's place in the history books to discover the Ultimate Final Secret of the Entire Universe, but boring as hell thereafter. Boring my left buttock. The brilliant minds who had devoted their lives to science would likely devote their lives to engineering.
  9. Re:pretty continua by John+Hasler · · Score: 4, Insightful

    > You grow, shrink, and twist in 4 spatial dimensions, X/Y/Z/T.

    That statement implies the existence of a second kind of time. If only x,y,z,t exist then you don't "do" anything in that four-dimensional space. You simply exist as a static four-dimensional object in a static four-dimensional universe.

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