4 ms·
https://www.black-holes.org/gw150914 https://www.black-holes.org/gw150914 has some visualization of the event. There is the initial inspiral, and then there is
by lutorm 11y ago
https://www.black-holes.org/gw150914 https://www.black-holes.org/gw150914 has some visualization of the event. There is the initial inspiral, and then there is a ringing afterwards. However, the entire event is over in a fraction of a second, which may be a "blip" to humans, but is very long when things happen at the speed of light.
- tizzdogg 11y agoThanks, that's helpful. It's hard to get my head around the idea that an event so massive can be over so "quickly", without any residual longer-lasting effects.
- lutorm 11y agoYou're left with a big-ass black hole...
- valarauca1 11y ago>without any residual longer-lasting effects A massive ripple in the very fabric of reality?
- tizzdogg 11y agoWell it sounds like a massive ripple in the fabric of reality which passes by us in a fraction of a second, never to be seen again. So from my non-physicist point of view, no it doesnt seem like a very long lasting effect, relative to us at least. Thanks for the snark though.
- lmm 11y agoThere's a theorem that black holes have "no hair": two black holes of the same mass, charge and angular momentum are indistinguishable. So the merge must happen instantaneously: if the combined black hole were "sloshing" afterwards that would violate that theorem.
- spacehome 11y agoWhether or not black holes have "no hair" is currently an unsolved problem. Hawking, for instance, believes that the Hawking Radiation from a black hole encodes the information that went into creating the hole. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole_information_paradox#Hawking_radiation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole_information_paradox...