HW: Fiction becomes Fact

[M Holmes]

Rudich, Robert A writes:

> I was reading a very interesting book on cosmology this past weekend that
> really struck a chord.   Naturally, it discussed black holes and naked
> singularities (a black hole without the event horizon to prevent interface).
>  A naked singularity is a place where physical laws no longer apply and
> there could be energy and matter exchange with the known universe.   As
> "proof" of the feasibility and existence of such a structure, the author
> pointed out that a naked singularity may be responsible for starting our
> universe.  The rationale is that no known application of physical laws could
> account for formation, so the start had to occur where current laws don't
> apply.

I'll preface this by admitting I'm not a phycisist, but wouldn't a
vacuum fluctuation serve as a starting point?

> How in the world does this apply to HW and why am I posting this drivel?
>   Have any of you considered what it would be like if you could get sucked
> into a black hole or naked singularity and live to experience it?

A big *if* given that gravity tides would shred you atom from atom, but
anyway....


>  As you
> may know, the acceleration provided by gravity there is at the speed of
> light.   Relativistic time dilation takes place and time would stop at light
> speed.   Thus, as you speed up, your experience would be that of slowing
> down

No. Your experience of time would remain constant. However, time
dilation would mean that time passed asymptotically more slowly outside
of your frame of reference.

> and eventually stopping as you hit full speed, never to hit the black
> core.

Unknown. As you say, at that point the laws don't apply.

> What is so great is that HW described these things well before the state of
> science could explain that they could be real.

Well, people like Fritjof Capra (sp?) in "The Tao of Physics" and Gary
Zukav in "The Dancing Wu Li Masters" (a much more readable book IMHO)
have claimed that eastern mysticism anticipated this stuff thousands of
years ago. Personally I'm skeptical but your mileage may vary.

Some of Hawking's writing isn't bad either, although I didn't find "A
Brief History of Time" particularly informative since it was subject to
the "Every equation halves the book sales" Law.

> Rudy

Yours Quarkily

FoFP