
Supermassive black holes found spiraling in at seven percent light speed - Rifu
http://arstechnica.com/science/2015/09/supermassive-black-holes-found-spiraling-in-at-seven-percent-light-speed/
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scott_s
Recent HN thread on a NY Times article talking about the same work:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10233874](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10233874)

That thread also contains an excellent description of the last parsec problem
by HN poster antognini.

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amelius
> Supermassive black holes are expected to come in pairs pretty often. That’s
> because every galaxy has its own supermassive black hole, and galaxies often
> merge, bringing the two together.

Okay, but following this reasoning, we should also see triples and quadruples,
I would say.

~~~
teraflop
A two-body system is gravitationally stable, and three or more are not (long-
term, in general).

~~~
blankhole
There are plenty of long-term stable three-body systems:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_star_system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_star_system)

Only 3-body systems nicknamed "Trapezia" systems are unstable:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_star_system#Trapezia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_star_system#Trapezia)

Regarding the article itself: it's a nice simulation, probably correct, but
the data barely supports the theory. Data is so noisy (and from different
instruments) - they didn't even bother showing a periodicity spectrum. Feynman
would call this bad science:

[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v525/n7569/full/nature1...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v525/n7569/full/nature15262.html)

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Balgair
Hmm, I wonder what it would be like to fall into a black hole rotating at
light speed then? In addition to the spaghetti effect, would it be a whorled
spaghetti effect? What would it be like to fall in from the top versus the
equator or another latitude? I wonder what the singularity at the center would
be like besides just a hoop. Can you make the singular hoop (english sure is
strange here) process if there is another large black hole nearby?

Man, I need more or less coffee, I can't tell which though.

~~~
samstave
Well, I have one theory -- but it hangs by a string at best...

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jostmey
What would happen mathematically if two singularities orbiting each other
merged? Would it become one singularity or some super nasty complex
mathematical system?

~~~
scott_s
See some reddit posts I pointed to in a previous thread:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10236561](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10236561)

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ck2
Don't really "weird" things start to happen when physical matter hits 10%
speed of light?

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jonstokes
"The Final Parsec Problem" \-- not to be confused with the Last Mile Problem
:p

~~~
richmarr
I don't know; there are comparisons you could draw between a telecoms company
and a supermassive black hole.

