Trio of Big Black Holes Spotted In Galaxy Smashup

sciencehabit writes Astronomers staring across the universe have spotted a startling scene: three supermassive black holes orbiting close to one another, two of them just a few hundred light-years apart. The trio, housed in a pair of colliding galaxies, may help scientists hunting for ripples in spacetime known as gravitational waves.

Comments

A four million year orbit

[Thanshin]

just 450 light-years apart and orbit each other every 4 million years.

I can't stop thinking that a four million year orbit means humans will have populated that galaxy before those black holes have completed one more cycle.

We're like smart bacteria inside a human being. We could learn about the season cycle, but but the time winter comes, innumerable generations of our descendants will already have killed our host and traveled to other ones.

Re:A four million year orbit

[Thanshin]

"What can be more palpably absurd than the prospect held out of locomotives traveling twice as fast as stagecoaches?" - The Quarterly Review, March, 1825.

"That the automobile has practically reached the limit of its development is suggested by the fact that during the past year no improvements of a radical nature have been introduced." - Scientific American, January 2, 1909.

"A rocket will never be able to leave the Earth's atmosphere." - The New York Times, January 13, 1920

"To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth—all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances." - Lee De Forest, 1957

They are 4.3 billion light-years away. They have already orbited each other a thousand full cycles since the observation (Well, you know what I mean.)
and they will spin another thousand before anything from here can reach them.

Re:Why did I read that as nipples in space time

[antifoidulus]

probably because the title talks about big black holes and a "smashup".....

Re:Please explain

[Taco Cowboy]

The article states

If the two black holes composing the newfound pair are equally distant from Earth, they're just 450 light-years apart and orbit each other every 4 million years

Can someone explain, or is this a typo? Do they not know if they're the same distance?

I ain't a space scientist, and I hope that what I say is correct --- please correct me if I am wrong --- what TFA is saying is, Black Hole 1 (Point A) and Black hole 2 (Point B) are spinning with each others and we are at a fixed reference point (Point C)

In other words, Point A, Point B and Point C make up a triangle, with Point A and Point B spinning with each other.

What TFA suggests is that when Black Hole 1 (Point A) and Black Hole 2 (Point B) happens to link to the fixed reference point (Point C) in which the distance of AC = BC , the distance of AB = 450 Light Years

As I have said, I ain't a space scientist, if I am incorrect, please correct me, thank you !

Re:Please explain

[PhilHibbs]

If we are looking at the system from "above", like looking down on a plate on which peas are rolling around, then the apparent distance between them is the same as the actual distance between them. If we're looking at them edge-on, then we don't really know how far apart they are. The apparent distance sets the lower bound for the actual distance, but the upper bound is unknown. And yes, there's always a degree of conjecture in astronnomy. All we can really say is that there are three black holes near the centre of that galaxy, and they are almost certainly in orbit around each other.

What people don't seem to understand is, science relies on publishing of un-proven theories. You observe, model, predict, publish, and eventually you will be either proven right or wrong. Without the "publish" step, especially in long-term sciences like astronomy where it could take centuries for a theory to tested (such as, "will that comet return in a hundred years"), you could make a thousand contradictory predictions and then publish the one that happened - by co-incidence - to be correct. If you limit yourself to a single prediction, which turns out to be correct, then you are worth paying attention to. My mum is always saying "Scientists keep getting things wrong, therefore all science is rubbish". Getting things wrong is crucual to scientific progress.

Re:Please explain

[Muad'Dave]

For all intents and purposes, the objects are the same distance from Earth. They're 450 light-years from each other and both are approximately 4.3 BILLION light-years from Earth. The maximum difference in distance between object A and Earth and object B and Earth is 0.000010465116% (450 / 4.3x10^9 * 100). Close enough to the same distance. For reference, the same delta applied to 1 AU (93,000,000 mile Earth-Sun distance) yields 9.73 miles.

Touch this black hole dude

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

I learned one important thing from that web site: It was programmed by yet another clown who feels it's vital to have a menu overlay taking up 25% of my scarce phone screen real estate.

I propose a Constitutional amendment to execute them. Whoever decided tiny screens need to be even tinier deserves it.