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The quintessential feature of a black hole is its "point of no return," or what is more technically called its event horizon. When anything—a star, a particle, or wayward human—crosses this horizon, the black hole's massive gravity pulls it in with such force that it is impossible to escape. At least, this is what happens in traditional black hole models based on general relativity. In general, the existence of the event horizon is responsible for most of the strange phenomena associated with black holes.
In a new paper, physicists Ahmed Farag Ali, Mir Faizal, and Barun Majunder have shown that, according to a new generalization of Einstein's theory of gravity called "gravity's rainbow," it is not possible to define the position of the event horizon with arbitrary precision. If the event horizon can't be defined, then the black hole itself effectively does not exist.
"In gravity's rainbow, space does not exist below a certain minimum length, and time does not exist below a certain minimum time interval," Ali, a physicist at the Zewail City of Science and Technology and Benha University, both in Egypt, told Phys.org. "So, all objects existing in space and occurring at a time do not exist below that length and time interval [which are associated with the Planck scale]. As the event horizon is a place in space which exists at a point in time, it also does not exist below that scale."
http://phys.org/news/2015-01-black-holes-space-theory.html
[Abstract]: http://iopscience.iop.org/0295-5075/109/2/20001/article
[Paper]: http://arxiv.org/abs/1406.1980
(Score: 2, Informative) by VortexCortex on Saturday January 31 2015, @08:10AM
One problem with that theory: The gravity was caused by a mass of matter, and is continued to be caused by a mass of matter. Changing the definition of "black hole" doesn't make the thing or its mass go away. In other words: It took matter to make that black hole. If it's not in existence then why does it have an effect on reality? Things that do not exist can not have an effect on reality.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 31 2015, @09:30AM
It's space, Jim, but not as we know, not as we know, not as we know it,
It's time, Jim, but not as we know, not as we know it, Captain.
(Score: 1) by dltaylor on Saturday January 31 2015, @10:00AM
It's about time, It's about space,
About strange people in the strangest place.
It's about time, It's about flight,
Travelin' faster than the speed of light.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 31 2015, @05:11PM
My millions of dollars that don't exist sure have an effect on reality.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Saturday January 31 2015, @05:19PM
“Everyone knows that dragons don’t exist. But while this simplistic formulation may satisfy the layman, it does not suffice for the scientific mind. The School of Higher Neantical Nillity is in fact wholly unconcerned with what does exist. Indeed, the banality of existence has been so amply demonstrated, there is no need for us to discuss it any further here. The brilliant Cerebron, attacking the problem analytically, discovered three distinct kinds of dragon: the mythical, the chimerical, and the purely hypothetical. They were all, one might say, nonexistent, but each non-existed in an entirely different way.”
― Stanisław Lem, The Cyberiad
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Saturday January 31 2015, @07:16PM
Indeed. If there is no time nor space there can be no matter, mass, or energy. I'll buy that we can't measure where an event horizon is; after all, you can't determine a particles speed and direction, only one of the two. But just because you can't measure something doesn't mean it's not there.
It's a nice mental exercise, and I'm sure the math looks nice (I didn't see any in the links) but it sounds like the science behind the infinite improbability drive.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience