Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!lll-winken!arisia!sgi!shinobu!scotth From: scotth@harlie.sgi.com (Scott Henry) Newsgroups: sci.space Subject: Re: Black hole trolling Message-ID: Date: 15 Mar 89 14:12:27 GMT References: <605212786.amon@H.GP.CS.CMU.EDU> <218100014@s.cs.uiuc.edu> Sender: news@shinobu.SGI.COM Organization: Silicon Graphics Inc, Mountain View, CA Lines: 20 In-reply-to: carroll@s.cs.uiuc.edu's message of 13 Mar 89 15:44:00 GMT > kpmancus@phoenix.Princeton.EDU in s.cs.uiuc.edu:sci.space : > Easy. The forces that hold a macroscopic object together are > electromagnetic. They require the exchange of virtual photons between > the particles to be held together. When the object extends across the > event horizon, the photons can no longer go from the atoms inside the > black hole to the atoms outside. Thus the tether is neatly sliced. This is incorrect. The definition of the event horizon is the point at which photons cannot escape to *infinity*. This in no way implies that they cannot cross the event horizon, they just cannot make it very far past it (depending on how deep they started). The bonds between atoms (nucleons) would begin to behave *oddly* as the energy of the virtual photons (gluons) would be different as seen by the higher and the lower (gravitationally speaking) particles. How oddly? Who's interested in a PHd thesis (maybe only a Masters)? -- --------------------- Scott Henry #include