THE BLACK HOLE WARS

Investigating paradoxes that revolve Investigating paradoxes that revolve around black holesaround black holes.

Richard DeCostaNovember 22, 2013

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TOPICS

● Brief description.● Contributions from Bekenstein and

Hawking. ● The Information Paradox.● T-Symmetry.● Dead or alive?● Contributions from Leonard Susskind and

Gerard't Hooft.● The next step.

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WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?

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EINSTEIN'S WORK● Black holes were initially predicted by Einstein's

theory of general relativity.

Image credit: Nasa.gov

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BLACK HOLE PROPERTIES?

● Massive star collapses● Gravitational forces warp space-time and are

so large that they crush the center into what is known as a singularity.

● “Place where space and time come to an end.” -Stephen Hawking.

● Cross the event horizon nothing can escape, not even light.

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BEKENSTEIN'S CONTRIBUTIONS

● In 1972 Jacob Bekenstein suggests that black holes must have entropy.

● Total information (entropy) contained within the black hole is proportional to it's area.

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HAWKING'S CONTRIBUTIONS

● If a black hole has entropy, it must have a temperature.

● Hawking confirms Bekenstein's work and derives a formula for the temperature of a black hole .

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HAWKING RADIATION

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HAWKING'S CONTRIBUTIONS

● If a black hole has a temperature and radiates energy, then it will eventually evaporate and disappear.

● But then what happens to the information?● Hawking's idea contradicts one of the most

fundamental principles in physics.

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INFORMATION PARADOX

● In classical physics, given the conditions of a system at a given point in time, we should be able to look back in time and understand what occurred prior to the present state.

● Causality

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CAUSE AND EFFECT

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QUANTUM IMPLICATIONS

● Heisenberg uncertainty principle conflicts with this idea.

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DOES T-SYMMETRY EXIST?

● If so, it leads to another theoretical object that comes out of Einstein's equations, known as white holes.

● Is the physics incorporated within black holes time reversible?

● Good question! Physicist are still working on this today.

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MORE PROBLEMS● Another question would arise as a result of

looking at a contradiction that occurs at the edge of a black hole (event horizon).

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DEAD …...AND ALIVE?● What occurs when falling into a black hole is

completely dependent on where the observer is.

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LEONARD SUSSKIND AND GERARD'T HOOFT

● There are no real contradictions therefore both occurrences my be simultaneously correct.

● Information remains stretched on the edge of a black hole, it is not destroyed and is still retrievable.

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HAWKING'S RESPONSE

● In 2004 at a conference in Dublin, Stephen Hawking retracts some aspects of his work that conflicted with some of these fundamental physical principles.

● He admits that information does not disappear after all.

● However, he claims that Susskind wasn't right either.

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CONCLUSION

● Leonard Susskind and Gerard't Hooft are currently working on theory known as the holographic principle.

● Stephen Hawking formulates a new theory involving the sum of all histories.

● Recent findings in L.Q.G. suggests that T-Symmetry exists.

● Although the information paradox was seemingly resolved the a battle continues between competing theories.

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REFERENCES

● DeGrasse Tyson, Neil (2007). Death By Black Hole, New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company Inc.

● Susskind, Leonard (2008). The Black Hole Wars, Stanford, CA: Little, Brown and Company

● Thorne, Kip S. (1994). Black Holes & Time Warps, New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company Inc.

● Schroeder, Daniel V.(2000). Thermal Physics, Addison Wesley Longman.

● Acknowledgements: Dr. Gothe, Dr. Altschul, Dr. Mazur.

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