From what they are, to where they might go,
and beyond!
Join me as we explore the question of, "where
do black holes lead to?"
Before we dive into the potential pathways
that Black Holes may have, it's important
to know exactly what they are.
Because while you might have a loose definition
as to what they are and what they do, they're
actually far more complex than you might realize.
Which is why many people in NASA and other
space programs are fascinated by them.
If you're looking for a technical definition,
this is how NASA describes Black Holes:
"A black hole is a place in space where gravity
pulls so much that even light cannot get out.
The gravity is so strong because matter has
been squeezed into a tiny space.
This can happen when a star is dying."
This singularity as it is often called is
a bit of a mystery in space, and for a very
good reason.
You see, black holes can form in large sizes,
small sizes, and sometimes they don't even
need a fully fledged star to form at all!
Which is scary in the sense that it means
black holes can form in various ways.
Plus, since no light can actually escape them,
it means that they can't technically be seen
by anyone.
That being said, it's easy to "see their work",
as the intense gravity of the Black Holes
is enough to stretch objects from their "starting
point" and slowly pull them to the Black Hole.
This is known as spaghettification, because
like a stretched piece of spaghetti, the object
will get thinner and thinner until nothings
exists but particles.
And if you think that a Black Hole is limited
in what it can absorb, you would be wrong.
Very wrong in fact.
If it is close enough, it'll break down a
star, a planet, multiple stars and planets
at once, etc.
It's a question of range more than anything.
But there's a catch to that, as you won't
be able to observe the spaghettification yourself.
Why?
Remember, no light escapes the void that is
the Black Hole, so because of that, you'll
see the last known position of the object
that light allows you to see.
It'll seem like they're stuck in place and
slowly going away until they're gone.
When in fact, they or it will be slowly pulled
apart.
As we noted earlier, one of the main ways
for a Black Hole to be born is to have a star
collapse upon itself with such pressure that
a Black Hole is a result.
However, technically speaking, just about
anything in the universe can become a Black
Hole.
How's that for a scary thought?
It's true though, and that's one of the big
"scaling" factors that you need to take into
account when you're talking about Black Holes.
In fact, there's actually a scarier thought
that you need to consider, and that's that
black holes could technically be all around
you right now.
The only reason you're not feeling their affects
is that they're not large enough to exert
their own gravity.
The scale of a Black Hole is referred to as
the Schwarzschild Radius.
And becoming a Black Hole is impendent on
you becoming so small and so dense that you
can fit into this radius, and then potentially
expand upon it.
For example, a human being can become a Black
Hole if condensed enough.
However, the pressure needed to do that would
not only be enormous, you could have to be
shrunk 1 sextillion times smaller than a grain
of sand.
That's REALLY small.
But that raises the question that we posed
earlier, mainly, where do black holes lead
to?
I mean, if they can be of all sizes, and be
anywhere from the size of a massive galaxy
to the spec of sand on a beach, how can they
lead to anywhere?
How does that work?
Would it work at all?
In the words of one scientist, "Who knows?"
"Falling through an event horizon is literally
passing beyond the veil — once someone falls
past it, nobody could ever send a message
back," he said.
"They'd be ripped to pieces by the enormous
gravity, so I doubt anyone falling through
would get anywhere."
Allow me to back up a little bit.
Remember the whole "spagheticfication" thing
I was talking about earlier?
Well, the place that you would be "stretched
to" is the horizon line of the black hole.
Think of a black hole like a funnel.
The big end of the funnel is the black hole
that you "see" in space, and the rest of it
is the core of the black hole that is hidden
beneath its intense gravity.
Now, if black holes DID lead somewhere, then
like the funnel, you would have an access
point through the core that you could go to.
You get it?
The problem here is that most scientists believe
based on their understanding of black holes
that a horizon line is what awaits you at
the end.
So if you think about the funnel again, think
about pinching the back end of it so that
nothing could get out of said funnel.
That's what a lot of people think is in the
center of a black hole, a literal end point.
Which would be a problem for those who think
it would lead anywhere...because it wouldn't.
It would end, and as the scientist above noted,
you wouldn't exactly be in one place to see
it.
IF this is the truth, then the answer to the
question of "where do black holes lead to"
is quite literally...nowhere.
And again, you'd be quite dead before you
would ever "find out".
But...if we were to extrapolate another answer
that you might appreciate...the OTHER answer
to "where do black holes lead to" might just
be..."somewhere else".
And I'm not saying that just to be cute, but
rather, to set up the explanation of ANOTHER
important theory, the theory...of a wormhole.
So if you've watched any kind of sci-fi show
that dealt with space travel and such, you
more than likely have heard of the concept
of wormholes.
To put it in the most basic of terms, wormholes
are "shortcuts" in the universe.
You go in through one side of the universe,
and you come out in an area that is REALLY
far away from where you were just a few minutes
ago.
Star Trek Deep Space Nine based an entire
series on a space station that protected a
wormhole that led to another quadrant of space.
But are these things really possible in our
own universe?
And if they were, wouldn't we have found one
yet?
The answers may surprise you, especially when
you hear that wormholes were speculated upon
by one of the most brilliant minds in the
world...Albert Einstein.
In 1935, Einstein and Nathan Rosen illustrated
the idea through the theory of general relativity,
proposing bridges across space-time, connecting
two different points of space-time, and theoretically
creating a shortcut that could reduce travel
distance and time.
Einstein-Rosen ”or“ wormholes ”.
Einstein’s theory of scientific relativity
mathematically predicted the existence of
wormholes, but no wormholes have been discovered
so far.
Some equations suggest the existence of wormholes
with mouths that are black holes, but obviously
we can't prove whether a black hole is a wormhole
because things and objects and people that
go into black holes don't come back out.
But we'll get back to that in a sec.
What this really boils down to though is the
concept of space-time, which Albert Einstein
theorized was the forces of space and time
together in a "fabric" if you were that made
up the entire universe.
And the reason the Earth, sun, and galaxies
are able to do certain things in the universe
(like cause orbits of moons and planets and
stars) isn't because of gravity per se, but
rather, because they are able to manipulate
the space-time around them into "valleys"
that cause things to rotate around them because
they get trapped into that valley.
Due to this, Einstein speculated that space-time
could be stretched, warped, depressed, and
yes, even torn into.
Which is where the original notion of the
wormhole came from.
Because if you open a "hole" in space-time...there
has to be something else on the other side,
right?
Believe it or not, Einstein and others have
noted that there are potentially 5 different
kinds of wormholes.
And yeah, some of those theories basically
state that a black hole is a kind of wormhole,
just one that isn't really "ready for travel".
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But IF the black holes were wormholes also,
that could open up all new possibilities for
us as a people, you know, if we could actually
get to them and use them properly of course.
So if they are wormholes and not just black
holes, when were they made?
The most probable answer is the Big Bang,
which is the theoretical event that scientists
speculate was the birth of our universe.
A moment in which an explosion of mass shot
in all directions and created the building
blocks of the universe via gasses, matter,
and more.
It took millions and billions of years to
form what we have now according to the theory.
But, that leaves a lot of times for certain
"holes" in the universe to be formed.
In fact, some speculate that because of the
violent nature of the Big Bag that there are
actually a plethora of wormholes in the universe
right now, all connected to another wormhole
via "cosmic strings" and they are just waiting
to be found.
Plus, you need to consider this from the cosmic
scope of things.
Let's say that in the universe, the whole
universe...there are 5 wormholes.
Ones that have a way in and a way out.
If you were to randomly place those wormholes
in the universe, what is the likelihood of
them landing by us?
Or in a place that we can view?
Would we even recognize them?
Could we even see them in the darkness of
space?
We know that black holes can't be seen, so
if all wormholes are black holes, that would
be a big fat "no" on that scale.
Let's get back to the topic at hand, let's
say that black holes ARE wormholes, and let's
say that not unlike Star Trek they connect
one part of the galaxy to the other, how exactly
would that work?
The answer here is "cosmic strings".
Basically, when the universe was born via
the Big Bang, and the wormholes were made,
a "connective tissue" if you will made these
wormholes work in the sense of going in one
place and going out the other.
I know that idea of "cosmic strings" may sound
rather sci-fi, but there is some basis for
this.
There are also other "theories" as to how
the black hole/wormhole thing could work.
For example, there are those who speculate
that the black hole leads to what is known
as a "white hole".
Which is exactly what it sounds like, a polar
opposite of a black hole, an entity that spews
out matter into the universe instead of sucking
it in.
In theory, this would make sense, as the black
hole would suck in mass from various objects
in its way, and then the white hole would
"spew" them out in its own way/direction.
Plus, a white hole is believed to not be able
to "take in" mass, so that would add into
the "opposite" factor.
But there's the twist, a white hole, in theory,
wouldn't be in our "own universe".
Which means that a black hole MAY lead to
an entirely NEW universe where the white hole
resides.
Which of course would mean that the VERY thin
line that separates a white hole from a black
hole would be the "divider" between dimensions.
An interesting thing to think about, but again,
kind of impossible to prove at the moment
given the very nature of black holes.
And of course, beyond the more "standard"
theories are the more "out there" ones...
"I think the standard story is that they lead
to the end of time," said Douglas Finkbeiner,
professor of astronomy and physics at Harvard
University.
"An observer far away will not see their astronaut
friend fall into the black hole.
They'll just get redder and fainter as they
approach the event horizon [as a result of
gravitational red shift].
But the friend falls right in, to a place
beyond 'forever.'
Whatever that means."
So yeah, that's totally not a depressing way
of thinking of things...
But getting back to reality for a bit, what
is the answer to "where does a black hole
lead to?"
In all honesty, all theories and speculation
aside, we just don't know.
There is no current way to see or understand
what's at the core of a black hole.
It's possible that it does lead to nothing.
It's possible that it leads to another part
of the universe, or another universe entirely.
Or it could be that it leads to something
that we just don't understand in any stretch
of the imagination that we have right now.
We just don't know.
Here's the thing though, it's ok NOT to know
just yet.
It's ok to wonder and speculate, because that's
how we start to figure things out.
We work at looking for solutions to questions
like these, and the result is usually we find
the answer somewhere in the middle.
Now yeah, given the nature of black holes
and how it destroys everything it touches,
it may be a while before we solve this mystery.
But that just means it'll be all the more
worthwhile once we do solve it.
Thanks for watching everyone!
What did you think of this look at black holes
and where they might lead?
Do you think that there is indeed something
on the other end of a black hole?
If so, what do you personally think it might
be?
Let me know in the comments below!
Be sure to subscribe, and I'll see you next
time on the channel!
