I'm posting this as a follow-up to yesterday's submission (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8363527). As I am not an astrophysicist, I am unable to evaluate the actual physics, but I wanted to point out the conversation going on among the actual physicists.
A point that was raised in yesterday's discussion was that if true, this theoretical work shows that black holes can't form from stellar collapse, not that they can't exist. Others contended, well, no, if it can't form, it can't exist; otherwise it would have to have had "always" existed.
Brian Koberlein points out in this submission that there are potentially alternative means of forming black holes, other than stellar collapse:
"This is interesting theoretical work, and it raises questions about the formation of stellar-mass black holes. But it doesn’t prove that stellar-mass black holes don’t exist, nor does it say anything about intermediate mass or supermassive black holes, which would form by processes other than stellar collapse. And of course the work depends upon Hawking’s take on firewalls to be correct, which hasn’t been proven. To say that this work proves black holes don’t exist is disingenuous at best."
Although I don't know what these processes might be.
Some googling has also turned up some astrophysicists who have snidely dismissed the work, but I am unable to evaluate their claims, or Laura Mersini-Houghton and Harald P. Pfeiffer's work in the original article.
Thanks for the article. I think the main point to be taken from this is in the excerpt you provided. While she raises some questions, she is not disproving the existence of black holes.
A point that was raised in yesterday's discussion was that if true, this theoretical work shows that black holes can't form from stellar collapse, not that they can't exist. Others contended, well, no, if it can't form, it can't exist; otherwise it would have to have had "always" existed.
Brian Koberlein points out in this submission that there are potentially alternative means of forming black holes, other than stellar collapse:
"This is interesting theoretical work, and it raises questions about the formation of stellar-mass black holes. But it doesn’t prove that stellar-mass black holes don’t exist, nor does it say anything about intermediate mass or supermassive black holes, which would form by processes other than stellar collapse. And of course the work depends upon Hawking’s take on firewalls to be correct, which hasn’t been proven. To say that this work proves black holes don’t exist is disingenuous at best."
Although I don't know what these processes might be.
Some googling has also turned up some astrophysicists who have snidely dismissed the work, but I am unable to evaluate their claims, or Laura Mersini-Houghton and Harald P. Pfeiffer's work in the original article.