That’s what Kareem El-Badry, an astronomer and a Ph.D. student at the University of California, had to say about the discovery of a new black hole. According to Badry, scientists have been studying the star system in which astronomers discovered this black hole since the 80s.
And if that is so, one is forced to ask the question:
Why Did it Take So Long to Discover This Black Hole?
Well, for one, black holes are . . . black. And space is . . . black. It’s kind of difficult to differentiate between the two. But we did capture an actual photo of a black hole last year, didn’t we? And that photo very closely resembled most digital representations of black holes.
This black hole, however, is kind of different. It interacts nonviolently with its environment. By this, we mean that it does not “feed off” clouds of gas—and therefore does not have a visible enough event horizon.
When astronomers discovered this black hole, they had instead been studying a pair of stars: the HR 6819. These stars had been observed behaving strangely: they orbited each other. That happens sometimes. It’s called a binary star system.
But there was more to this star system.
In 2004, it was confirmed that the system was different from standard binary star systems. At some point, astronomers must have realized that the stars weren’t orbiting each other: they were orbiting another object. An invisible object with a force of gravity massive enough to force the revolution. That object could only have been one thing: a black hole.
How Significant is This Discovery?
The discovery spells out, for science, another step in the ongoing developments on black hole-related research. Space science is certainly the star of the hour. But the discovery is far more significant for humankind.
The discovery is revolutionary for many reasons. For one, it confirms that our own Milky Way is full of black holes. It also may confirm that extraterrestrial life, existing on planets orbiting these black holes, is closer to Earth than we reckoned.
The black hole is said to be a thousand light-years away. That might seem like an impossibly long distance to humans, but what would it be for beings that are far more advanced?
We know that habitable planets revolve around black holes. We might have evidence that UFOs could be flying out of supermassive black holes. Entire rogue worlds could easily exist in the planetary systems around these huge centers of gravity—and now we know one exists in our own backyard.
Time for Caution or Celebration?
For some time, hidden truth researchers have known that benevolent, as well as mercenary extraterrestrials exist near us—and even among us. Given the presence of grave danger, due diligence is always a good idea. Join the discussion by signing up for the forum on Get Wisdom and interact with people asking the same questions as you.