From Russell Watson
Michael Lemonick describes a black hole as “a spinning point of infinite density surrounded by an event horizon from which nothing can escape, not even light” (6 October, p 36). I have been reading this description for about 30 years. It has been repeated so often in all sorts of media that in has become ingrained into our psyche, so much so, that the phrase itself now seems beyond question.
And yet it does seem obvious that something may, in fact, escape from the black hole. If it does exist, the graviton must be able to perform this feat – otherwise how else can the hole further accumulate mass?
And if a passing body is accelerated by the spin of the hole, surely in accordance with Einstein’s theory of the equivalence of mass and energy that body must gain mass equivalent to that the hole must lose?
Beaumaris, Victoria, Australia
