From: mary whalen <marewhalen@yahoo.com>
Subject: (urth) Re:  Black hole vs. wormhole
Date: Sat, 4 Jul 1998 09:47:40 

This is Sean Whalen (prion).

Matt Freestone wrote:

>This sounds right- it's a positive feedback cycle, but >it doesn't
prove your claim that the process only >takes a few seconds:  it
depends how big the black >hole was to start with, and on the rate of
growth.

The initial size of the black hole doesn't have much to do with the
time for the cycle to complete.  Any size of a hole would complete the
process in under a minute (probably under thirty seconds, but I'm not
sure).  Even a microscopic black hole would absorb enough mass in
under a second to be much more massive than a human.

The calculations that an astrophysicist would have to perform would be
how small the initial black hole would be before the outer part of the
star exploded before the black hole finished (as it would if the hole
was microscopic).  I explained that stars which naturally create black
holes at their cores (which our sun will never be able to do) either
are going to fall entirely into the black hole (if it's big enough to
absorb it in some number of seconds) or partially explode (if it's
smaller and takes a few extra seconds).

Scientists still don't know the exact size a black hole must be in
relation to the star it's absorbing to completely absorb it (and it's
more complex than just a ratio on these two things).  Nevertheless, in
either case, the process is very quick.

prion
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