quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Thanks. I had not been following that.

As for “theory,” though, scientists use the term to mean something that is different from how it’s been corrupted into general use. There are countless scientific “theories” that have been demonstrated to be true beyond any reasonable doubt.

Yes. My post was a bit of poor levity made mostly out of awe for Einstein himself. My brain does not exist in the same galaxy as Eintein's and it is humbling to see what he was able to accomplish. I've heard in the past that Theoretical Physicists weep when they see the beauty of Einstein's formulas, a position that was echoed almost verbatim by one of the scientists at the conference.

A person with average intelligence is capable of learning advanced math through trigonometry. Calculus takes a bit more ability than that. Once you reach the levels of some of these folks I am convinced that it is a gift.

quote:

Originally posted by thunderson:
Once you reach the levels of some of these folks I am convinced that it is a gift.

Indeed. It is fascinating that there are these luminaries throughout history that are so far ahead of their times.

What happens if he stops smiling?

quote:

Originally posted by thunderson:
Once you reach the levels of some of these folks I am convinced that it is a gift.

I agree. Isaac Asimov opined that when it came to understanding mathematics we all have a level to which we can rise, and then that’s it: It’s as if there is a ceiling that we can’t break through.

Some people, however, seem to have no intellectual limits, or at least none that the rest of us can ever hope to reach. Just yesterday I read an article in the science journal Nature about an 18-year-old woman, Ewin Tang, who has shattered some concepts about quantum computers. The conventional wisdom was that it would take (theoretical at this point ) quantum computing to solve certain problems. She showed, however, that no, it doesn’t; conventional computers can do it. I can barely comprehend the problems, much less how they could conceivably be solved.

Some minds are literally incredible to me.

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Yeah...exactly! I was wondering how long it took for that light to reach the telescope cameras. Just amazing stuff...

They used radio telescopes, so what we're looking at is actually an optical representation of radiowaves emitted by the fast-moving matter in the accretion disc. Of course those took just as long to travel here. The principle of using multiple telescopes also remains the same - you increase resolution of the emitting points. Awesome anyway, I don't care which part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

What a wonderful age of discovery and technology we live in. My wife and I are both big time space nerds so this will be fun to watch together after work tonight.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Isaac Asimov opined that when it came to understanding mathematics we all have a level to which we can rise, and then that’s it: It’s as if there is a ceiling that we can’t break through.

Agreed - or at least it becomes a LOT harder to expand your mind.

I have a BS in Mathematics and I am great using a lot of the theories in Applied Mathematics, but REALLY struggled in some of the theoretical classes where you have to jump through all of the proofs - it was frustrating because up until that point I had always been an A student in math, rarely struggled with concepts, or any of it. It was like someone poured concrete into my brain and I could no longer understand it, or it took a lot longer to get it. After surviving that class, I moved into Mathematical modeling / Applied math and had no issues.

Now when I read some of the Astronomy / Science books for fun (yes, for fun), I literally read a chapter once and stop - sometimes I have to read a couple of pages and then really think it over. It's mind bending stuff (well, at least my mind) and as they push the bounds of understanding, lots of it is theory / conjecture, albeit well reasoned.

quote:

Originally posted by AllenInWV:
Sharpened it up a bit....this does not bode well.

Allen, this post was too good not to be a meme. So I have added it to the meme thread.

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Isaac Asimov opined that when it came to understanding mathematics we all have a level to which we can rise, and then that’s it: It’s as if there is a ceiling that we can’t break through.

Agreed - or at least it becomes a LOT harder to expand your mind.

I have a BS in Mathematics and I am great using a lot of the theories in Applied Mathematics, but REALLY struggled in some of the theoretical classes where you have to jump through all of the proofs - it was frustrating because up until that point I had always been an A student in math, rarely struggled with concepts, or any of it. It was like someone poured concrete into my brain and I could no longer understand it, or it took a lot longer to get it. After surviving that class, I moved into Mathematical modeling / Applied math and had no issues.

Now when I read some of the Astronomy / Science books for fun (yes, for fun), I literally read a chapter once and stop - sometimes I have to read a couple of pages and then really think it over. It's mind bending stuff (well, at least my mind) and as they push the bounds of understanding, lots of it is theory / conjecture, albeit well reasoned.

My guess is one's ability to only be able to think in terms of images that represent constructs that you can physically see in your mind, or see "enough" in your mind in a physical sense. After that it's pure brain power with abstract thinking. I'm in the former group. I read a book called Relativity for Dummies in college, with the goal of actually understanding just the POINT of it. I read some sections several times, but with no understanding at all. I still don't know what the hell it is or how it is important, even though I know it IS important. It's frustrating to know something is important but you still don't have a clue what is IS.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
The really remarkable thing about that image is that it was acquired with ground-based telescopes.

I read in this article, Darkness Visible, Finally: Astronomers Capture First Ever Image of a Black Hole, that it was an array of radio telescopes that produced these colorized images after 2 years of computer analysis of 10 days of observation. Still very cool though.

JP

Anything seem odd about that ring?

I am neither an astronomer nor an astrophysicist, but this seems odd to me.

I'm not saying there are no black holes in the center of galaxies. I can easily imagine that. Heck, I can imagine that maybe all the crud circling around them - i.e. the galaxies of stars - may have been attracted into galaxy formations by their black holes in the first place.

No, what bugs me is this - possibly faulty - chain of logic:

1) whatever the black hole is doing, it ought to be roughly spherically symmetrical.

2) the black hole doesn't know or care where Earth happens to be.

3) from #1, whatever the phenomenon is that the picture is made from, it ought to be happening between us and the black hole as much as anywhere else

4) from #2 and #3, if there is activity everywhere, implicitly including on the direct sight line between Earth and the object, why would there be a dark area at the center of the picture taken from Earth? That implies that while there was activity in a 'ring' perpendicular to the Earth-black hole viewing angle, nothing was/is going on in the center, and if #3 holds, there's as much going on between us and the black hole as anywhere else.

5) From #4, I am wondering who did what image processing to turn this into a ring?

Or am I out to lunch?

Yeah, Joel. You should straighten out all those astrophysicists. Clearly, they need your input.

??

quote:

Originally posted by joel9507:...
Or am I out to lunch?

quote:

Originally posted by joel9507:
Anything seem odd about that ring?

No.
If you are concerned that the same people who filmed all the moon landings in Hollywood are up to their old tricks once again (what staying power they have!), it might help to take a look at one of the countless explanations of why rings are formed around black holes. A good discussion here:

https://www.nature.com/article...-ee20e6b2b4-43423637

It's an accretion disk around the event horizon as it is also spinning rapidly. It is brighter on one side as the matter on that side is moving toward us (at nearly the speed of light, emitting tremendous amount of radiation and energy), dimmer on the other side as it is moving away from us. The shadow in the center is due to the gravity well, and precisely what they hoped to confirm with these images. Additionally we aren't viewing it edge-on.

The other interesting thing about the computer reconstruction is that they used a large number of different imaging algorithms and they almost universally produced a similar image with the ring structure. That is why it has taken them two years to reveal this image.

Wow. We now have evidence besides theoretical math that supermasive blackholes really do exist.
Just imagine what we'll learn tomorrow.

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:

quote:

Originally posted by joel9507:...
Or am I out to lunch?

Man this cracked me up!

JP

quote:

Originally posted by AllenInWV:
Sharpened it up a bit....this does not bode well.

Here is a good explanation of the image:
https://youtu.be/zUyH3XhpLTo

quote:

Or am I out to lunch?

I'm pretty sure thinking of it as a hole on a 2 dimensional plane is your problem.

Think instead of a "black sphere", or a black hole that is round and in three dimensions.