No such thing as Black Holes??

I hope this isn't a re-post. I just found an interesting article in "New Scientist" titled;

Mysterious quasar casts doubt on black holes
The following excerpt summarizes it quickly:

A controversial alternative to black hole theory has been bolstered by observations of an object in the distant universe, researchers say. If their interpretation is correct, it might mean black holes do not exist and are in fact bizarre and compact balls of plasma called MECOs........
......A well accepted property of black holes is that they cannot sustain a magnetic field of their own. But observations of quasar Q0957+561 indicate that the object powering it does have a magnetic field, Schild's team says. For this reason, they believe that rather than a black hole, this quasar contains something called a magnetospheric eternally collapsing object (MECO). If so, it would be best evidence yet for such an object.

I honestly don't know what to think of it, especially since I am not a space buff. Maybe someone here who is more knowledgeable can explain whether or not this discovery/theory is plausible? If it proves to be true, it would be a very signifficant find in my opinion. I know that at least a few widely accepted theories would most likely have to be revised. What do you think?

There's been other theories that attempt to replace the idea of black holes. They all seem to add extra complexities that just dont add up and are based more on unknown than the known. These MECOs appear to be the same. They could of course exist, as our understanding of the universe is extremely limited, but I dont see any reason to completely dismiss black holes. Black holes are elegant and simple, they are easily explained, and explain much. I have yet to see anything come close to this.

Agreed... The simplest explanation is usually the best. Of course, I'm not saying that MECOs do not exist, but rather that both exist.

Aside from that, black holes have been observed and studied quite a bit in the past 20 years. While humanity may not know every little nuance about them, it's sure to say that we know that they exist.

Also, I don't think that the article is trying to say black holes do not exist, but rather that they may not be at the center of quasars like believed.

[edit on 7/31/2006 by cmdrkeenkid]

Nevertheless, it can't be argued that black holes are "uncomfortable" objects. The concept of matter being compressed into a singularity (with zero volume and infinite density) has always made me feel rather uneasy.

Originally posted by 2manyquestionsThis quasar contains something called a magnetospheric eternally collapsing object (MECO). .

YOUE SEE.. This is why I love ATS you get to find out info you would never have the time to find individually..

Blackholes have always been a fascination to me..The fatastic/science-fiction and the factual..

Here we have a new theory that is almost a bridge between the two.

Think about it. An eternally collapsing object..Now if you could be part of that singularity ond observe the Universe expanding infinitely around you..What would you see once you got down to molecular size.. Would they not appear to be Planets as you shrink further..would you not find that other things/life exist living on the surface of these new '' planets''

OUCH my brain Hurts when I think of these things.. like WHAT IS OUTSIDE OF THE EDGE OF THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE????...Nothing? how? It defies physics..

arrrrggghhhhh. brain overload again..

WATS for finding this and causing me more suffering..

[edit on 1-8-2006 by AGENT_T]

Black Holes, dark matter and energy and a bunch of other Astronomical phenomena could be bunk.

Take a look at www.thunderbolts.info

They predicted, almost perfectly and certainly much better than NASA, the results of the Temple 1 impact. As an astronomy buff, their theories seem to mach up quite will with observed reality. As for the current comet theory of the ‘dirty snowball’ I think that after all of the flybys and photographic and other evidence that it has a snowball’s chance in hell of being right. But still scientists hold on to it, like dogma not fact. Adjust the theory; adjust the theory, how about looking at a new theory, one which fits the observable evidence much better than the current one.

Martian blueberries? They recreated them in laboratory experiments. Every wonder why all craters are circular? It does seem a little strange that the ALL meteors come in at a 90 degree angle, or maybe they aren’t impact craters at all, but instead, excavated by massively scaled up electrical discharges, which remove the surface material in a circular pattern.

The nice thing about the EU theory is that it is reproducible in the lab as electrical phenomena can be scaled up or down.

uhhhhhhhhhhm. What? Massively scaled up electrical discharges? Do they hit the bong before coming up with these theories? Not only are there countless impact craters that are clearly made at odd angles (the ones that survive the drastically increased atmospheric resistance), but if what you say is true... What happens when meteors impact? Does it just not happen? cus I think it does...

It's one thing to try and come up with a better fit theory than what is presently accepted. It's another to just make stuff up as a basis for the theory. I theorize that the Lord Zeus is responsible for lightning. With all that doesn't make sense about lightning, it fits the facts way better than static discharge.

NASA isn't the only one that theorizes about black holes, they are observed globally. Predictions are made, accurately, based on the theory. I tend to avoid .info and .tv sites. Do they have a 'Pay With PayPal' button anywhere? Could you elaborate on just how they declare that Black Holes could be bunk?

It does seem a little strange that the ALL meteors come in at a 90 degree angle, or maybe they aren’t impact craters at all

To form a circular crater, the impact can be as low as something around 45 degrees, they dont need to be at 90 degrees.

Originally posted by apc
uhhhhhhhhhhm. What? Massively scaled up electrical discharges?

You should have a look at some other sites. The Electric Universe theory isnt that stupid, in fact (and Ill try and find links) main stream physics isnt as against it as you seem to be. Google electric universe and have a good read, take your time with it too, jumping to conclusion based on one site is a bit premature.

One site

These high altitude discharge patterns are known as Blue Jets, Red Sprites, and Elves. From Discovery magazine, 1997.

My bolding.



There is so much more to be discovered which means theories like this will have extra room to move in and to be honest, science cannot explain electricity fully, basics like this havnt been conquered completely by science.

Dont those electrical discharges rely on an atmosphere, something which the moon hasn't got - and its got plenty of circular craters ??

For this reason, they believe that rather than a black hole, this quasar contains something called a magnetospheric eternally collapsing object (MECO).

Isn't it accepted that the black hole/whatever distorts time [a result of the space-time distortion].


Therefore, isn't it possible that time slows towards a standstill the close the object gets to actually collapsing on itself - hence it is indeed "eternally collapsing".

Originally posted by Dae
You should have a look at some other sites. The Electric Universe theory isnt that stupid, in fact (and Ill try and find links) main stream physics isnt as against it as you seem to be. Google electric universe and have a good read, take your time with it too, jumping to conclusion based on one site is a bit premature.

I was directly referring to the idea that all impact craters are actually electrical discharge excavations. Better than an inverse glass universe I suppose...

Originally posted by cmdrkeenkid
Agreed... The simplest explanation is usually the best. Of course, I'm not saying that MECOs do not exist, but rather that both exist.

You're right. That is always a possibility.

Also, I don't think that the article is trying to say black holes do not exist, but rather that they may not be at the center of quasars like believed.

Here's the reason for my title:

it might mean black holes do not exist and are in fact bizarre and compact balls of plasma called MECOs........"I believe this is the first evidence that the whole black hole paradigm is incorrect," says Darryl Leiter of the Marwood Astrophysics Research Center in Charottesville, Virginia, US, who co-authored the study. He says that where astronomers think they see black holes, they are actually looking at MECOs.

The wording of those sentences made me believe that the scientists involved in the observations think that all black holes 'may' be MECOs instead. I could be wrong of course.

I'd like to add a few more articles on this new theory, just to give you guys more material to digest:

]Three Cosmic Enigmas, One Audacious Answer

Frozen Stars

What if Black Holes Didn't Exist?

Do Black Holes Exist, or are They Really "Dark Energy" Stars?

As I've said before, I have no idea what theory to believe, but he makes at least one valid point. Many scientists who oppose him, (who believe black holes do in fact exist) have been working with this theory for years. They have written many books, and lectured many students and peers. This new theory comes along, and suddenly years and years of work and beliefs are possibly in danger of being flushed down the toilet. I can see how some well-established scientists might do all they can to disprove this theory just to save their careers. After all, they are only human. I suppose we'll just have to sit back and see what happens. This should be an interesting battle however it turns out.

EDIT: Just found this blog by Lubos Motl (co-founder of String Theory),.... one of George Chaplain's opposers.
Just to offer you a different opinion: Lubos Motl's Blog





[edit on 1-8-2006 by 2manyquestions]

Originally posted by apc
I was directly referring to the idea that all impact craters are actually electrical discharge excavations. Better than an inverse glass universe I suppose...

Actually I was incorrect, main stream science is more accepting of Plasma Cosmology than of the Electric Universe theory, however Electric theory ties in Plasma cosmology.

Personally anyone claiming that all impact craters are electrical discharges, is a tad overzealous, I think its that tendancy to try and find one nice theory to explain everything, no good, not without all knowledge being know, then we can have a theory of everything.

This image is from Schroter's Valley on the moon:

Does Plasma Cosmology have anything to say about black holes?

And that picture looks much more like lava flow than any kind of energetic discharge.

With impact craters... thing is to my knowledge noone has ever seen one pop up without an impact. We have witnessed impacts on the Moon and the resulting craters. We can find meteorite fragments in impacts here on Earth.

All these new-age explanations for well understood events... dark energy stars and quantum inflated masses etc... just seem to overcomplicate fairly simple concepts. Yes they could be correct in regards to specific instances. But generally it makes more sense to adapt the current theories as they fit the fundamental observations, than to create brand new theories that leave too much to the unknown.

Basically speaking the Electric Universe Theory is Plasma Cosmology, just extrapolated into something more coherent.

1st off, as one of the posters said, I was overzealous in my 'ALL' claim and I apologise.

But what's so hard to believe that the universe is electrically instead of gravitically driven? Nature itself is electrical, we're electric, the plants are electric, they sky is electric, the whole planet is electric. Space is not a vacuum, thare be plasma out there. Astronomers don't dispute this, the dispute and disregard thereof is that in the mainstream view that you can't get charge separation in space while in the EU you can.

If you took the time to peruse thunderbolts.info then you can't deny that these guys are putting out a pretty good case, DAILY!. And I don't think there are any bongs over there So let's go for the most proveable case, comets. All of the mainstream scientists have been blown away and utterly surprised with each new discovery. "The theory will have to be adjusted." "We didn't expect that". As I stated in my earlier post that the people at thunderbolts made their predictions, based on the EU theory, that were quite accurate. NASA, it cannot be said did such a good job using their theory.

www.thunderbolts.info...

But since many of you won't click the link here are the highlights:

ELECTRIC MODEL PREDICTIONS FOR DEEP IMPACT:

* An abundance of water on or below the surface of the nucleus (the underlying assumption of the “dirty snowball” hypothesis) is unlikely.

* Tempel 1 has a low-eccentricity orbit. Therefore its charge imbalance with respect to its environment at perihelion is low. (It is a “low-voltage” comet.) Electrical interactions with Deep Impact may be slight, but they should be measurable if NASA will look for them. They would likely be similar to those of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 prior to striking Jupiter’s atmosphere: The most obvious would be a flash (lightning-like discharge) shortly before impact.

* The impactor may form a sheath around it as it enters the coma, becoming a “comet within a comet”.

* Electrical stress may short out the electronics on board the impactor before impact.

* More energy will be released than expected because of the electrical contributions of the comet. (The discharge could be similar to the “megalightning” bolt that, evidence suggests, struck the shuttle Columbia).

* Copious X-rays will accompany discharges to the projectile, exceeding any reasonable model for X-ray production through the mechanics of impact. The intensity curve will be that of a lightning bolt (sudden onset, exponential decline) and may well include more than one peak.

* If the energy is distributed over several flashes, more than one crater on the comet nucleus could result—in addition to any impact crater.

* Any arcs generated will be hotter than can be explained by mechanical impact. If temperature measurements are made with sufficient resolution, they will be much higher than expected from impact heating.

* The discharge and/or impact may initiate a new jet on the nucleus (which will be collimated—filamentary—not sprayed out) and could even abruptly change the positions and intensities of other jets due to the sudden change in charge distribution on the comet nucleus.

* The impact/electrical discharge will not reveal “primordial dirty ice,” but the same composition as the surface.

* The impact/electrical discharge will be into rock, not loosely consolidated ice and dust. The impact crater will be smaller than expected.

After you learn about it and don't just disregard it like the current paradigm is your religion, it makes a lot of sense and is much more elegant than dark matter and its ilk.

[Oops, a typo, I'm a stickler.]


[edit on 2-8-2006 by Thanatos]

Thank you for correcting your mistake. The only thing I have "disregarded" is your mistaken statement that all impact craters are not impact craters at all. Obviously, that was wrong.

I'm not arguing against any alternative theories to explain the reality we perceive. These are all child theories that will lead to the grand unification of all theories to give us a final understanding of existance. Using both gravity and electricity to explain everything are actually both valid perspectives. They can describe the same thing, fundamentally. Much in the same way that Zero Point Theory and String/M Theory, when you look closely, describe the same thing.

I'm still wondering if theres a related alternative explanation for black holes.

black holes certainly do exist. however, we have only begun to research them and never knew everything (or much) about their nature. they are a phenomenon that exists that we can see, and ascertain information and theories. we havent found every black hole and we havent experimented with them in any depth.

so the original theory as to what a black hole actually is may be incorrect but it still creates a 'black hole' in space. a rose by any other name...

How can you say "we most certainly know black holes exist"? We have never actually seen one, just the reported and theorized effects. All that about nothing, not even light being able to escape.

I've composed a set of links from thunderbolts.info for you to look at for an alternative explanation. I'm not saying that the EU theory is right, that would be quite presumptuous of me. What I am saying is to take a look at the evidence and base your conclusion, NOT BELIEFS, on the available data.

www.thunderbolts.info...

www.thunderbolts.info...

www.thunderbolts.info...

We've only been at this space thing for a short while and as we discover more we must be open to re-evaluating what we think we know, and not fall into dogma.