Albert Einstein’s 1915 calculations suggested that if you cram too much stuff into too tight a space, the result would be a “black hole”, an area so dense that not even light could get out. This theory is tested whenever Beyoncé squeezes into her designer jeans.
Einstein’s theory was so preposterous that even he rejected it. Turns out his calculations were correct and black holes exist. Now a really big one has been photographed.
The announcement came on April 10, 2019. A worldwide collaborative effort by science guys and gals who are called astronomers, focused large and complex telescopes located around the world on one small area of space 55 million light years from Earth. The process captured the picture of a black hole, seven trillion times more massive than our Sun.
While astronomers, who spend their free-time predicting things based on the signs of the Zodiac, understand these big numbers and distances, the Clown realizes that for the average reader, they are difficult to grasp.
So, let’s stop here and get some perspective. First, a light year is the distance a beam of light travels in one year. Light travels very, very fast, even faster than a jerk in a BMW. Light travels at 186,000 miles per friggin’ second. Then, as some of you know, a year is the time it takes to go from January 1 to December 31. Put the two variables together and, voilá, a light year’s worth of distance.
One light year is, let’s see….carry the eight, multiply by seconds in a year…. 5,880,000,000,000 or 5.88 trillion miles. Thus the black hole now immortalized on film is 323,000,000,000,000,000 or 323 quadrillion miles out in space! If you plan to go for a look-see, pack a lunch.
An object seven trillion times more massive than our sun is described by astronomers as “one honking’ mutha”. We can certainly be thankful that this huge baby is 55 million light years away because a black hole has a voracious appetite for any and all things: matter, time and space. As it gobbles up stuff, it grows larger and more voracious. Sort of reminds the Clown of Orson Welles or a do-it-yourself home remodeling project.
According to Shep Doelman, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and a really, really smart guy in spite of being named Shep, “We’ve exposed a part of our universe we’ve never seen before.” Ya think?
Walter P. Berger, Phd., the astronomer tasked with identifying what is inside this black hole, says that the contents so far include several thousand e-mails from Hillary Clinton’s private e-mail server, trillions of mis-matched socks and Jimmy Hoffa.
The Hoffa find indicates that the Gambino family has unlocked the secret to deep space travel.
Counter-intuitively, black holes spew violent jets of energy and gas from their fiery accretions disks of swirling, doomed matter. Some of these gas jets travel up to 5,000 light years into space. Astronomers refer to this phenomenon as Friction Associated Radiating Trajectories (FARTs). Clearly, astronomers are a fun, fun bunch. The intense pressures and magnetic fields cause energy to squirt from either side. Some astronomers suggest that much of the matter in the universe, which is consumed by black holes, is entirely made of re-fried beans. Others are skeptical. Thus does science proceed.
When briefed on the latest validation of Einstein’s theory regarding black holes, President Trump indicated that his father and Einstein had been classmates in the charming village of Ulm, Germany. He tweeted, “My dad was far better, much, much smartter at math than Einsten. My dad chose too go into real estate instead of phisics. No money in phisics, none, nada. Poor Al ended up on a teacher’s salary at some college, no private club memberships, no gold bathroom fixtures and nearly broke. What a loser. Sad!”
Observoid of the Day: Tell a lie often enough and it’s still a lie.