• Question: are there such tings as white holes< if so are they linked to white holes?

    Asked by Oliver Johns to Heather, Helen, Hugh, Jane, Julian on 14 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Julian Onions

      Julian Onions answered on 14 Nov 2014:

      White holes are a theoretical thing. They sort of pop out of some equations as a possible thing, but although they show up in these equations, and they are a sort of natural opposite to black holes, there is no evidence for any of them in the universe.
      It was once thought that quasars were white holes, but we now understand these, and they are actually powered by black holes.
      So – there is a linkage between white holes and black holes, but so far they just remain a hypothetical entity.

    • Photo: Helen Johnson

      Helen Johnson answered on 16 Nov 2014:

      Yep, white holes and worm holes are totally theoretical things – we’ve never observed these things even though they are very often shown in science fiction! I went to watch Interstellar tonight, which had some really interesting wormhole based storylines 😀 Black holes however are totally real, and we’ve studied many of these. We just don’t quite know what’s at their centre, and may never know. Probably not Mathew McConaughey though…

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