In 2015, we don’t know a whole lot about black holes, and scientists have been racking their brains for some time about the events that happen when anything (light, a space ship, even the Sun) comes too close to one.
However, if you did happen to find yourself falling into one, Stephen Hawking’s latest theory may comfort you, because according to the 73-year-old theoretical physicist, a black hole could be a pathway to another universe. Boom.
That’s his latest explanation for the “information paradox” – the idea that black holes appear to swallow matter, which according to the way the universe works, should be impossible. But we’re a hopeful race.
NASASpeaking at a public conference in Stockholm, Sweden, Prof Hawking elaborated: “The existence of alternative histories with black holes suggests this might be possible,” Hawking said. “The hole would need to be large and if it was rotating it might have a passage to another universe.
According to his theory, and described by the KTH Royal Institute of Technology (where he was speaking), there are two ways it could end if you did find yourself floating towards a black hole: One, you could become permanently stuck in a ‘2 dimensional hologram’ on the edge of the black hole. Nope. Or two, you find yourself breaking into an alternative universe. Yep.
Philip Toscano/PAHawking went on to say that if this happened, you couldn’t come back to our universe – and while he is ‘keen on space travel’, that is something he’s not going to try. And we don’t blame him.
He finished by saying that black holes are not the eternal prisons they once were, and that things CAN escape them, but if you come out of the other side, you will most likely find yourself on a whole new playing field.
Good luck with that.
