super massive black hole ejected from its own galaxy

[rkell87]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2012/06/05/a-supermassive-black-hole-was-ejected-out-of-its-home-galaxy/

The Chandra X-Ray Observatory announced that’s it has observed something unprcedented: a supermassive black hole being ejected from its own galaxy at speeds of millions of miles per hour. The evidence suggests that the ejection was caused when the black hole collided with the supermassive black hole of another galaxy, producing an immense recoil force.

“It’s hard to believe that a supermassive black hole weighing millions of times the mass of the sun could be moved at all, let alone kicked out of a galaxy at enormous speed,” said study leader Francesca Civano in a press release. “But these new data support the idea that gravitational waves — ripples in the fabric of space first predicted by Albert Einstein but never detected directly — can exert an extremely powerful force.”


The ejection of the black hole actually took place about 4 billion years ago, as astronomers observe the radiation from galaxy CID-42, which is 4 billion light years from Earth. Astronomers reviewing data from the Hubble Telescope first noticed something interesting was going on. The visual data was then confirmed by telescopes on the ground.

“The previous data told us that there was something special going on, but we couldn’t tell if there were two black holes or just one,” said study co-author Martin Elvis. “We needed new X-ray data to separate the sources.”

[CowboyMcCoy]

Far out.

[wittenacious]

So all black holes are NOT treated with equal respect? Apparently the galaxies have their way of dealing with inferiors too.

Black hole, "You Are The Weakest Link — Goodbye!"

[ABQCOWBOY]

Just goes to show you. don't matter how big you are, there is always somebody bigger in the neighborhood.

:laugh2:

[CowboyMcCoy]

Just goes to show you. don't matter how big you are, there is always somebody bigger in the neighborhood.

:laugh2:

Yeah, funny black holes aren't really holes in the sense they cannot be moved. Funny how right theories about these things are, only to be discovered and proved to be true later on. Astrophysics/Astronomy has to be the coolest science out there, imo. Too bad we've given up on it.

[JonJon]

That is unprecedented. You would think that the more massive black hole would just swallow up the smaller black hole like it does everything else.

[Sam I Am]

“It’s hard to believe that a supermassive black hole weighing millions of times the mass of the sun could be moved at all, let alone kicked out of a galaxy at enormous speed,” said study leader Francesca Civano in a press release.

What is funny about how much force it would take to eject something that is super massive is the weakest of the four fundamental forces. (Gravity, Electromagnetism, Weak Nuclear Force, and Strong Nuclear Force) It's the weakest by a large margin too.

Even though it's the weakest force, it's also the dominant of the four forces in the universe.

[Sam I Am]

That is unprecedented. You would think that the more massive black hole would just swallow up the smaller black hole like it does everything else.

Kinetic energy is what causes it to eject. As it falls towards the larger blackhole, it's picking up speed not only from the bigger blackholes pull, but it's own pull draws it closer even faster picking up a lot of speed. If its tajectory is off target by a wide enough margin and it has generated enough kinetic energy, instead of falling in, it will end up being slingshot away.

We (well, NASA) has actually used gravitation assist (slingshot effect) to get space probes to go faster as they head into deep space.

You can read about it here (http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMXLE0P4HD_index_0.html).

[casmith07]

Doesn't this kind of turn black hole theory on it's head?

[CowboyMcCoy]

Kinetic energy is what causes it to eject. As it falls towards the larger blackhole, it's picking up speed not only from the bigger blackholes pull, but it's own pull draws it closer even faster picking up a lot of speed. If its tajectory is off target by a wide enough margin and it has generated enough kinetic energy, instead of falling in, it will end up being slingshot away.

We (well, NASA) has actually used gravitation assist (slingshot effect) to get space probes to go faster as they head into deep space.

You can read about it here (http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMXLE0P4HD_index_0.html).

Basic fundamentals of Newton's laws.

That link does not work for me.

[CowboyMcCoy]

Doesn't this kind of turn black hole theory on it's head?

No, we already knew black holes were just dense objects (stars in the process of dying) that are collapsing on themselves. They have burned up all of their energy and have begun to die, but they are not holes in the sense you may be thinking. The gravity is so strong from the collapse that even light particles are sucked in. Thus, "black holes".

http://www.cosmos4kids.com/files/stars_blackholes.html

[Illini88228]

I know it's no where near the most interesting thing about the article, but how long ago the stuff happened that we can see here and now still blows my mind as much as it did in 3rd grade when they told me the first time. 4 billion years.

[ScipioCowboy]

What is funny about how much force it would take to eject something that is super massive is the weakest of the four fundamental forces. (Gravity, Electromagnetism, Weak Nuclear Force, and Strong Nuclear Force) It's the weakest by a large margin too.

Even though it's the weakest force, it's also the dominant of the four forces in the universe.

It's also the only fundamental force that's never been observed at the quantum level. Consequently, there's been a concerted effort in the scientific community to deny its existence.

[RastaRocket]

I really have no idea how to even picture what I just read; but that is awesome.

[CowboyMcCoy]

It's also the only fundamental force that's never been observed at the quantum level. Consequently, there's been a concerted effort in the scientific community to deny its existence.

...without success.

[ScipioCowboy]

...without success.

Can you imagine the implications if gravity didn't exist at the quantum level? It would completely change our fundamental understanding and assumptions about the universe.

We view the universe as having a "bottom-up" construction. This view affects how we interpret and find meaning in the data we gather. If it isn't true, you're forced to rethink everything.

[Sam I Am]

Can you imagine the implications if gravity didn't exist at the quantum level? It would completely change our fundamental understanding and assumptions about the universe.

We view the universe as having a "bottom-up" construction. This view affects how we interpret and find meaning in the data we gather. If it isn't true, you're forced to rethink everything.

I bolded a few things that wouldn't exist without gravity in your statement. :laugh2:

[arglebargle]

Really interesting to see how some of these theoritical points turn out to be just like they were imagined. That guy was a regular Norman Einstein! :D

[djmajestik]

Yeah, funny black holes aren't really holes in the sense they cannot be moved. Funny how right theories about these things are, only to be discovered and proved to be true later on. Astrophysics/Astronomy has to be the coolest science out there, imo. Too bad we've given up on it.

Astronomy is really cool, but quantum physics (or any of the quantum fields) are infinitely more interesting IMO.

Still really cool stuff.

[SaltwaterServr]

Astronomy is really cool, but quantum physics (or any of the quantum fields) are infinitely more interesting IMO.

Still really cool stuff.

For me looking at astronomy versus quantum physics is like looking at a huge wedding cake. Its a beautiful creation, and you enjoy it immensely. However, once you get into what goes into the cake as ingredients, ie particle and quantum physics, then you've got an equally interesting part of science to explore.

[Sam I Am]

I'm a selfish pig. I love both. :D

[CowboyMcCoy]

Can you imagine the implications if gravity didn't exist at the quantum level? It would completely change our fundamental understanding and assumptions about the universe.

We view the universe as having a "bottom-up" construction. This view affects how we interpret and find meaning in the data we gather. If it isn't true, you're forced to rethink everything.

Yeah, which is why I was skeptical about the "particles that traveled faster than light"... it just doesn't happen to our knowledge.

On a side, I always found it interesting that the poets had much insight on astrological issues, like Edgar Allan Poe... not a bad scientist, for a poet.

The Thought of a Thought - Edgar Allan Poe



Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) is best known as a literary figure, a writer of short stories and poetry, but a surprising amount of his thought was devoted to natural science, with which he seems to have had a love-hate relationship, as illustrated by his "Sonnet to Science"

Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart...?

In this attitude Poe is somewhat reminiscent of Goethe (1749-1832), who spent so much time and effort on his own private theory of colors and the indivisibility of light, trying to overthrow the teachings of Newton (1642-1727). Indeed, Goethe himself is said to have valued his "scientific" work more highly than his literary creations (an opinion not shared by anyone else). Another artist who struggled with the emerging scientific culture was William Blake (1757-1827), who wrote

Mock on, Mock on, Voltaire, Rouseau,
Mock on, Mock on, 't all in vain...
The Atoms of Democritus
And Newton's Particles of light
Are sands upon the red sea shore
Where Israel's tents do shine so bright.

The fascination and ambivalence these men felt toward Newton, the personification of Science, is well illustrated by Blake's famous painting "The Ancient of Days", showing a kneeling God-like/Satanic figure spanning the darkness with a compass of light. Remarkably, Blake's illustration of "Newton" is essentially the same figure, in the same pose, viewed from the side.



This gives some idea of how great, throughout the 19th century, was the prestige of Newton as the discoverer of the only true laws of nature, the indisputable confidant of God, especially among intellectuals, including poets and artists as well as scientists. It's not surprising that many creative and independent men felt, as Blake put it, that

I must create a system, or be enslaved by another man's.
I will not reason and compare, my business is to create.

We may also remember Laplace's remark that

Newton was the greated genius who ever existed and the luckiest, because we cannot find more than once a system of the world to establish.

What does this leave for his successors? Since Newton associated every action with a re-action, it's only fitting that there was a reaction against the scientific Enlightenment of the 18th century, leading to the Romanticism of the 19th century. One characteristic of those who rebelled against the Newtonian approach to knowledge and understanding was (and still is) an antipathy for mathematics. Prior to the scientific revolution, it was possible for scholastic philosophers and thinkers of all kinds to engage with the great questions of natural science in the verbal and teleological tradition, but Galileo and Newton effectively put an end to this. Among serious thinkers with little or no inclination toward mathematics, imagine how discouraging must be the famous words of Galileo:

The rest:http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath522/kmath522.htm

[Future]

Literally all I could think of when I saw the title...

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