h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Did John Wheeler consider this term to be a misnomer?

Surely it is an appropriate description of "Mans" knowledge of what lies beyond the event horizon?

I guess he didn't, as he coined the original phrase before they were fully understood, but even Prof Stephen Hawking changed his mind about them as recently as 2004.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3913145.stm

Black Hole is not an appropriate description. Absence of light does not make them black. If I wear a green jumper and skirt in a coal cellar and turn off the light, that doesn't make my clothing black. And "hole" implies there is something beyond the event horizon, when there isn't.

I was thinking of "black hole" as a figurative term - as a black hole in Man's knowledge. I thought that beyond the event horizon we had a hole or limit to what knowledge could be determined. The link to the Hawkings article suggests that the knowledge becomes hidden only to be later emitted back into the universe in mangled form at a later date (according to some theory I am ignorant of).

It will be interesting to see whether "black holes" will be reclassified/relabelled - similar to poor old Pluto that has been demoted from a planet to a dwarf planet .

I agree Black Hole has entered folklore as a term meaning "bottomless pit" - like the world's finances.

I don't think the name for the quantum singularity will change. It's a term everyone knows, and only those interested in astronomy or physics know it's wrong. As for Pluto, I was one of the rare few who agreed on its demotion from planet to dwarf planet status. After all, when Eris was discovered, it was bigger, something Americans can appreciate so something had to give. I rather like that there's now a round figure of 8 planets and multiple dwarf planets in our Solar System, and am happy that that's what our schoolchildren of the future will be taught (I was taught nothing about astronomy, being English, we only had General Science and I got one lesson on the Solar System)

I think black holes are black. If light falls on them, they absorb the light rather than reflecting it. That's what black means.

And they are a hole in the sense that you can throw things into them, like a hole in your back garden. If I said you had a hole in your back lawn, you wouldn't assume it was into another dimension, would you? But people seem to think that black holes are gateways into a different dimension, which they aren't.

Black holes are well named, from our perspective. Refusing validity to that, you would have to ban such words as sunrise and nightfall.

This post has been removed.

Very well, I bow to the majority and have changed the entry. Reported it at the Curators forum as well

GB

you would have to ban such words as sunrise and nightfall.
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That gets me thinking about black body radiation ... even the sun approximates to a black body radiator.

If black hole is not appropriate then maybe cosmic vacum would
be more to your liking. But remember when trunning the light out
it want make it dark or will it?

A misnomer is some one said the speed of light is the maximum speed
if that is so how can light disapear into a black hole

I think most of space is quite a good vacuum in that it is on the whole "empty", but I think I know what you mean;
it's a pretty good cosmic hoover

Yes, the sun and all stars are black bodies giving off black body radiation. But black holes also give off black body radiation (according to Penrose and Hawking), so it is black by that definition too!

"A misnomer is some one said the speed of light is the maximum speed
if that is so how can light disapear into a black hole "

That is pretty much the definition of a Black hole. The fabric of space time is so radically curved around them that speed becomes almost irrelevant. No matter how fast you go your just running in circles.

The "event horizon" of a black hole is the point at which the curvature of space-time and the speed of light cross. Thus, since light can no longer escape, it follows that nothing else can either.

It's a four-dimensional check valve of sorts.

A black hole has nothing to do with any Dimensional it consumes mater
at a rate that can not be equal pluss the fact its a solid object
it has nothing to do with time only that it took time to become a black hole and as for escape it convert what it take into energy
that has not been name yet

Black holes have a lot to do with time. The strong gravitational field around them slows down time and at the event horizon time stands still.

If time stand s still then nothing would have been swallow becourse it would be frozzen it time so light would show up and never fade
so that puts your time out to grass becourse all that gose in has gone or did the black hole thats not a hole but a sollid mass turn into a real hole and time stud still then fell through

What you see when something falls into a black hole is it slowing down and stopping at the event horizon, where it remains forever. After reaching the event horizon it fades until it is no longer visible. Logic tells us that it has actually entered the hole but we never see it happening.

The speed of light doesn't stop it falling in -- quite the contrary. Nor does it help it getting out.

forget the hole it dose not exist its a dence mass that has a gravitaional pull greater than any other oject know to man the stars that are pulled in dont go down the dimmer switch route it there then its not no waving good by