elwoodblues

Be honest; you knew the whole concept of a black hole was a bit of a cop-out, anyway.

<a href="http://www.cosmiverse.com/space01170204.html" target="_blank">http://www.cosmiverse.com/space01170204.html</a>

elwoodblues

Um, I just re-read it in detail, and it gets extremely freaky about half-way in.

"Mottola says that if you scale the size of a gravastar up to around the size of the visible Universe, the pressure of the vacuum inside roughly matches the pressure that seems to be accelerating the expansion of the Universe. So our Universe might be one big cosmic gravastar: a giant shell trapping the Milky Way and all the other galaxies we see. "We might be able to entertain the really radical notion that we -- and everything we see in the Universe -- could be inside such an object," Mottola speculates."

That is just a totally wild idea. It's also exciting as hell; it's been a long time since anyone's made broad, sweeping claims like this. The quantum universe seems to have scared the hell out of everyone. Not these guys, apparently...

GunnerJ

This whole gravastar thing seems like a really big neutron star. But really, how does this change things? How is "springy vacuum" any better an explaination than a singularity? How is an event horizon the sucks everything in and adds to the total mass better than a "gravity shell" that turns anything that touches it into more vacuum?

elwoodblues

"How is "springy vacuum" any better an explaination than a singularity?"

Well, apparently, the mathematics actually work with this. There's always been some points where the black-hole concept breaks down (the article outlines those nicely). However, the only barrier right now with these gravastars seems to be in the formation theory. They haven't yet nailed down how the things are formed yet. Other than that, apparently it's feasible. Unlike black holes, which have almost as many problems as the solve.

Steven S

I just downloaded their Physical Review Letters article and will read it when I have the chance. I'm sceptical that their idea actually avoids a singularity, though. I think accreting matter would more than likely make the thing unstable but
I could be wrong.

eh

Damn, and I thought the mystery of black holes had been solved, when the brilliant Dr. Jack Van Impe revealed to us that they are in fact gateways to hell. Oh well...