Event Horizon Telescope. But 10 Times Better

We got two images of supermassive black hole with the Event Horizon Telescope. But can we make it better? How can we take the telescope to the next level and resolve a photon ring of a black hole? Finding out with Ben Hudson, System Engineer from KISPE Space.
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00:00 Intro
01:50 What is a photon ring
04:56 Structure around black holes
08:36 How can we resolve the photon ring
12:51 Making the Event Horizon Telescope bigger
44:28 What can we learn from the photon ring
53:10 Final thoughts and more interviews
More interviews:
👉 Far infrared interferometer:
kzbin.info/www/bejne/aX-TZHpvjMeMp9E
👉 Giant space interferometers
kzbin.infoRSPpakbgUS0?si=zi9XTHXS-7ur0q9v
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[@DerInterloper]

When you started talking about L points, That you tell him "Your audience knows all about them" I felt proud that you are my teacher, and happy that you take pride in your students.

[@douglaswilkinson5700]

Mass curves spacetime. At a certain distance from the EH the path is circular. Photons travel along this path. From their reference frame they are traveling in a straight line.

[@andym4695]

As a veteran Kerbal Space Program spacecraft designer, I usually put three relay satellites in orbit around whatever I'm looking at, which gives me coverage regardless of which side of the object is facing Kerbin (earth).

[@davidianmusic4869]

Love the intelligent questions, being able to follow the interviewee’’s line of thought and pushing to resolution on points not clearly made. Would be fabulous to hear you with Neil Turok talking about his latest ideas from his recent Perimeter Institute lecture. Clear skies!

[@MrJPI]

One arc second is the angle subtended by 1 mm size object seen from distance of 209 m. So 20 micro arc seconds gives then same angle seen from 10,000 km. On moon that corresponds to an object of size 38 mm. The EHT's angular resolution is somewhat less than 20 micro arc seconds, so the resolution might correspond the angle subtended by a coin on the Moon1.If the resolution improved 10 fold that would be absolutely incredible!

[@kurtilein3]

The wavelength is awfully specific though.

[@anthonyalfredyorke1621]

Another top guest Fraser, things are definitely looking positive in the world of astronomy & the future is bright, is it me but these engineers are getting younger? , " I know I'm just getting older!! " . I can live with that, because the alternative is much worse!! . PEACE AND LOVE TO EVERYONE ❤❤.

[@rJaune]

I’m glad you talked about the data involved when having a space-based EHT. I was worried about overflowing the DSN, or having to eject HDs to Earth periodically. Haha!

[@dave7038]

Very cool topic, I enjoyed the interview, and hearing from a space systems engineer. Hope to hear more about this project in the future! I did struggle a bit with Ben's audio, perhaps a sibilance issue? The captions are good quality though, no problem following along that way. I prefer to listen without looking at the screen, so I do appreciate the usual very listenable quality.

[@ericganz4432]

This is an interesting proposal, you should be able to use laser communications for downlink

[@peterb9038]

The synchronisation of data with atomic clock could be reduced by modulating a laser signal between antennas representing the data sample,there would need to be a time signal encoded somehow, maybe polarity blips or similar. I was thinking with the raw observation modulated in the laser link signal, you could do a first step interferometry processing at the receiving station by using the constructive and destructive interference between the signals, if you can delay or frameshift the sample from the two telescopes to match up the samples, then the data may have a post processing property that allows it to be compressed effectively.

[@slo3337]

I had thought of looking at photon rings. There would be layers of them with the inner layers being closer and closer together and contain information further and further in the past. Theoretically you should have some photons still wizzing aroung from the creation of the black hole but that layer would be the dimmest and thinnest layer.

[@kurtilein3]

They want to see that, to confirm or contradict current theories. If it looks just like we expect, then WOW, we were right. If it looks different, even more exciting, much of our current understanding will be in doubt and we are forced to make progress in order to explain it.

[@MrAluntus]

Hey Fraser, I was sitting here thinking about the data bandwidth problem and making the remote telescopes more intelligent. There are many ways to reduce the amount of data, including just sending back the differences and reconstructing it and the other end. I would think these types of algorithms would be implemented before giving AI to a telescope.

[@marenpurves4493]

Not working for VLBI., you need the time resolution (which gives the space resolution). Currently the data disks from the South Pole Telescope have to wait until they can be shipped (by ship). (I work at one of the telescopes that are part of the EHT, we ship physical disks from Hawaii)

[@MrAluntus]

​@@marenpurves4493 that's cool that you work on the EHT. Thank you. Clearly I don't understand how the images are created, so ignore my comment if it makes no sense. I was assuming they are image files, but they are radio signals. Isn't there a lot of zero data or is it there always background noise in the signal that makes it hard to compress?

[@marenpurves4493]

@@MrAluntus I work at one of the telescopes, and I have some idea about the amount of data - but I have no idea how the images are generated either.

[@donporter8432]

Great questions for him! Really got him thinking 🤔!

[@peterb9038]

It's nice to know that Ben now has a good source of information on L points now. 😀

[@KenMathis1]

This channel has convinced me that the future of extra solar analysis is in observation, not exploration. We, and any advanced civilization too, will invest in bigger and better telescopes to view the galaxy rather than trying to physically travel there in any significant way. Direct observation is far more likely to work, will give results in a extreme fraction of the time, and is more cost effective. Just build bigger and better telescopes to directly image the things you want to see instead of sending some limited probe, waiting 1,000s to 100,000s of years to get a result, and hoping nothing catastrophically breaks or wears out during all that time.

[@redcirclesilverx4586]

Keep the hits coming! Also, space based inferameter please.

[@PauldeSwardt]

Great interview!

[@ariaden]

Interferometers are devices that extract information from interference. Aperture synthesis is possible only if both the amplitude and the phase of the incoming signal are measured by each telescope. But for some historic reason, aperture synthesis is still considered to be a type of interferometry. I guess "acoustic camera" got its name just because microphone array vendors did not realize they are doing "a type of acoustic interferometry".

[@ruspj]

hmm any time i hear the red mars series mentioned i was allways confusing it with the red rising series with Darrow i enjoyed a few years back. my mistake - i guess that means i have something new to look for :)

[@RGAstrofotografia]

If there was a planet orbiting S2 and we had a ELT there, what would we see from Sagittarius A*?

[@erichanson9014]

As always great guest.

[@BenEng]

Consider adding communications satellites (laser) for relaying and routing along the path. If the bandwidth limitations are due to round-trip latency, using relays to reduce the per-hop latency will fix that.

[@marenpurves4493]

As Ben said, resolution also depends on observing frequency used. Higher frequency receivers are not available or useful for telescopes near sea level because they can't see through the atmosphere most of the time. Some more resolution can be obtained if/when more telescopes at higher elevations (above more of the atmosphere) get more higher frequency receivers. - FYI: in VLBI there are no images taken at any one telescope, and your map is missing the GLT.

[@Urgelt]

Seeing the accretion ring is cool but not a big surprise. That's a high-energy phenomenon, spitting out photons. But seeing a photon ring? That idea baffles me. A photon trapped in an orbit releases no photons. If it isn't trapped, it won't depict a ring to our instruments. More space instruments is a terrific idea, however. More resolution!

[@witwisniewski2280]

The existing EHT used time slots available on existing telescopes. Even if the instruments were dedicated to EHT, the time that all of them can view a black hole at the same time is seriously limited by the joint sky coverage. Putting the antennas out in space can allow nearly continuous observations to render higher quality results.

[@royparrish2515]

Sounds like there is a huge need for a new generation of Space to Ground Deep Space Data handling capability that would allow for all of these newer observation platforms that are on the drawing boards.

[@myaschaefer6597]

Great Interview, I really enjoyed hearing from Ben. I do have a question for you Fraser. I guess I don't understand why it's so important to try to see inside a blackhole in order to understand them. Yes it would be extrodinarily cool, but can't we extrapulate what's become of matter inside a blackhole by looking at the variables surrounding blackholes? Such as gravitational foot print, the diameter of the event horizon, etc? Doesn't science frerquently rely on extrapulated evidence, rather than preceiving the actual results? Thanks, Mya

[@frasercain]

This wouldn't let you see inside. That's probably impossible. This would let you see just outside the event horizon to the photon ring. Although science can rely on indirect evidence, it's always best to have direct evidence. Imagine if you tried to figure out what an animal was purely by its footprints.

[@johnny1968a]

Thanks!

[@triskeliand]

The deployable structure is 3d printed in zero G in situ as an extruded antennae. The simplest system I can think about is the deployment of flagella using only a limited number of interlocking proteins. Obviously hardened photosynthetic proteins would help.

[@rJaune]

Could you map the area around the black hole by watching the photon rings for certain period of time? Great interview!

[@davidmcsween]

Question! Could you infer what's going on inside a black hole by the effects of its gravity on the photon sphere? Like eddy currents or perturbation from the geography of the gravity from the singularity? Or is it too smooth to show?

[@cavetroll666]

Very cool video

[@garyswift9347]

That was really cool. Thanks again. I wonder if they could buy a laser link system from SpaceX.

[@ZeroIQ2]

Really cool interview! BTW I'm waiting for the day I'm at a pub quiz and the question "Which Lagrange point is the James Webb Space Telescope at?" lol

[@marvinmauldin4361]

Going up to four spatial dimensions enables us to see inside closed rooms and drawers. How many dimensions of String "Theory" would we have to look through to see inside black holes?

[@marshalleubanks2454]

A micro arc second (5 picoradians) is 2 mm on the Moon as seen from Earth.

[@Chamuzi]

@25:29 What do you think of the far side of the moon as a choice and the Dark Side of the Moon as an album?

[@donporter8432]

The ultimate distributed processing challenge!

[@dougrudd3218]

Could we put radio telescopes at L4 and L5 which would beam their data to a dedicated data processing satellite located at L1? The L1 location should be able to generate enough power to support the processing needs and the incoming radio transmission to L1 would be less impactful since most observation made there are optical of the sun.

[@YTEdy]

For a non rotating black hole, the photon ring is 1.5 black hole radii from the center or 1/2 radii from the event horizon.

[@petevenuti7355]

Is that the first half orbit ring and how is that number derived?

[@YTEdy]

It's curved space. On Earth, escape velocity is higher than orbital velocity. Around a black hole space is curved enough that orbital velocity is higher than escape velocity. The photon ring, or photon sphere is what it's usually called, is outside the event horizon. I understand that it doesn't make sense, but it's true. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photon_sphere @@petevenuti7355

[@JayCross]

I imagine that the bandwidth problem for this could be solved by shuttling data on SSDs to and from the telescopes on a small rocket, which can also resupply the SSDs for the next round of observations. You could have 100s of Petabytes that you exchange annually.

[@frasercain]

It would be like the start of the space age when satellites returned canisters of film.

[@JayCross]

@@frasercain Yes, but now you could do it from the Earth-Sun Lagrange points.

[@slo3337]

I think i remember the photosphere of a black hole as being 2 SR. Anything closer spirals inward.

[@MStrong95]

24:26 Maybe there is a way to develop a compression algorithm using the data from the earth based observations to ensure that the compression algorithm works most efficiently with the specific observational data in question. I'm not a programmer or anything of an authority on what could work but I think there has to be something that can be done to improve the data compression rate. Outside of compression there is a related field of data deduplication which maybe could be used with traditional compression and archival techniques to reduce the data footprint at least for transport or transmission. The newest discovery that I've seen is how AI large language models and AI physics simulations and AI in general can do some groundbreaking things so maybe there is something there to as well for investigation. Basically I think there's maybe at least a chance to solve the problem with the data quantity at least for sending it easier and in a meaningful amount of time.

[@Niosus]

I had a whole course about this at university. Sadly physics is very limiting in this regard. There is a fundamental limit to how much information you can send over a certain distance, when transmitted at a certain power level and received with a certain dish size. We've been very close to that physical limit for a long time. There simply won't be any breakthroughs there, other than improving the focus of the transmitted power by using lasers instead of radio waves. There is a similar story with compression. Modern video compression technology has gotten really far by being very intelligent about which details we can throw away. But if you need something that's (close to) lossless, we've had near-perfect algorithms for decades. You can always optimize things more for specific use cases, but don't expect miracles. You need enough bits to encode entropy of your input data. If that data has high entropy, there is just nothing you can do. AI can do wonderful things, but if you let AI compress data, it needs to decide which details to keep. Which means you need to tell it in advance what to look for. You're essentially baking confirmation bias right into your data processing pipeline. I'm not saying AI doesn't have a role it can play, but it can't beat physics and mathematics. You have to be extremely careful.

[@kurtilein3]

The problem is, for interferometry you need to data-link a minimum of two observation sites. Anything useless can be discarded, and anything useful requires a minimum of two sites observing the same object at the same time. To do interferometry later, you need the raw data, here only lossless compression is possible, you cannot know which bit of information will be useful before you bring both datasets together and comparatively analyze them. The data also needs to be of high quality, so you work with packets and checksums and re-request bad packets and so on. So basically, no. Its even worse, if that space telescope is in some way more capable than the ground-based telescope system we have, you can throw away that additional data immediately and basically dumb it down to what we can verify and use. Anyway, best case or worst case, you still end up with large amounts of raw data where only lossless compression is permitted, and you have to use packets and checksums to ensure the quality of the data. One idea would be a relay-sattelite in earth orbit, with a very good data connection to earth, and a small dedicated telescope staring at one object in one wavelength. Then the space telescope could use a laser just pointing at earth to pump down the data using the laser. It does not matter too much if the connection is intermittent, as long as we can move huge amounts of data sometimes. Anyway, unfortunately the solution will not be in programming, we do have to move that data using only entirely lossless compression.

[@NunoPereira.]

Is there a way to simulate or to theorize that what caused the primordial black holes was the extreme bursts of energy generated by the matter antimatter annihilation, which then disturbed and caused the collapse of space-time in those particular spots?

[@noelstarchild]

Am contemplating that the density of matter/antimatter would create audio waves to cause the remnant matter to align and cascade into primordial black holes.

[@JMOUC265]

I also struggled with Ben’s audio. I listened to the podcast version. His audio sounds like it is coming from an oil can microphone and essentially was unintelligible for me, so I quit trying about a third of the way through. I tried slowing down the playback to 0.75 and that was marginally better, but not good enough for me to continue. All of your work, Fraser, undermined for some of us by apparently strange audio setups on the other end. When I get time, I hope to watch the video and use CC. Thanks for your programming.

[@davidrowewtl6811]

Q: As we ship data from Antarctica for vlba why not just launch a big usb key back from the satellite towards a catcher around earth, to return the data to earth?

[@yasirarafat9279]

i have said it on another youtube channel.Black holes might be the collision of different kinds of space time structures that might be colliding with each other.Similar to what happens in a Tornado(twister).

[@bjornfeuerbacher5514]

And what is "space time structure" actually supposed to mean? How would you describe that mathematically? How does something like that actually form?

[@ericganz4432]

Singularities are only present in theories. In reality, there is no infinite density. So a correct theory will need to be developed in the future which will account for black holes to have a finite size and finite density inside. This is a well-known fact about black holes

[@808bigisland]

Infinite density is smeared along the time vector of 14.6 bn

[@bjornfeuerbacher5514]

@@808bigisland Pardon? What is a "time vector"? What does it mean that something gets "smeared along a time vector"? What do you mean with "14.6 bn"?

[@DeceptiveRealities]

How do the photons get slowed so they have the ability to orbit and then leave? Surely they'd enter on parabolic or hyperbolic trajectories, unless they have somehow been slowed - in which case how do they exit?

[@jbruck6874]

Very interesting content - I wish the interviewee would speak a bit clearer for us non english natives to be able to follow better.

[@_Teo_Dor]

What makes the photons to propagate in a straight line? If Photons do not have mass, then inertia is not working to maintain the direction of movement, What is the process of maintaining the direction of movement?

[@frasercain]

They don't have mass, but they do have momentum.

[@Cooky00123]

Could they take images of these black holes from each side of Earths orbit?

[@theforlanjoker4457]

I'm pretty sure they did

[@seasonedbeefs]

I think they are taking the data every passing/night

[@EK14MeV]

The array size resolution of radio telescopes works through simultaneous, parallel operation of contributing VLBI sites. They use an atomic clock to synch the timing of data capture site acquisition of all sites at any one time.

[@Niosus]

Getting a telescope to L3 would in theory allow for that super large baseline, but communication and synchronization are very difficult since the Sun is in the way. It's probably. I just started watching the video, but without hearing more from Ben, I'd guess a wide halo orbit around L2 with multiple observatories makes the most sense. Easy to get to, easy communication and always near Earth.

[@EK14MeV]

@@Niosus It’s the EARTH-MOON L3, NOT the Earth-Sun L3, where they would place the satellite radio telescope to move in a continuous loop around that point. The Earth-Sun L3 is beyond the opposite side of the Sun, relative to the Earth-Sun line.

[@brendanware2930]

'It's not about the size of your telescope. It's about the way you use it' 😂

[@douglaswilkinson5700]

Leave that to the astrobiologists.

[@Temp0raryName]

My proposal would be a postman satellite(s) which travel between the points of the interferometer, with enough shielding to protect both the data being carried and the on-board computational capability. It can transmit key data as it calculates it. Then compare whether there would be a way of swapping physical 'hard drives or if the increased transfer rates for being in close proximity at the appropriate points in its orbit, would alllow enough transfer of bulk data.

[@austinsapp5867]

Would it make sense to use radio telescopes on the lunar surface, Earth's surface, and a few in-between to act as a massive interferometer? Could this be a future collaborative goal once we start building Lunar observatories?

[@frasercain]

Sure, any distance between your telescopes makes for a bigger virtual telescope.

[@austinsapp5867]

Thanks for the reply, Fraser! I'm falling into the habit of watching every video you post. Love the content 😁@@frasercain

[@ioanpena]

First !

[@khxml]

I wonder if we could view black holes better by a resolution of quantum entanglements instead of relying on the light given from their accretion disks.

[@bjornfeuerbacher5514]

That's rather vague. Which entangled particles are you talking about? What exactly do you mean with "resolution" here?

[@martinhuhn7813]

Well, that was informative. However, I wonder, how much observation time such a telescope would need for one of such improved black hole images. In other words: How many targets would we be able to thoroghly observe in the expected lifetime of the instrument?

[@kurtilein3]

Not many targets i imagine. That can change if we scale these things up, or build a whole fleet. If they build one, i imagine it staring at the same object for months as the ground-based Event Horizon Telescope stares at the same object for months. If we get one of these space telescopes, in order for it to be useful at all, it must be linked to the ground-based Event Horizon Telescope. You need a minimum of two to do any interferometry at all. One is on earth. They have to follow the same scedule. Any data observed by only one telescope has to be discarded. The situation improves if we get more than one going in space, in different locations. We have a very similar situation with gravitational wave observation. Here one site, one interferometer, yields nothing. You need several. You can do science with two, and it is much improved if you have 3. Add one in space, and you gain nothing unless you have your ground-based observation in order. With 3, you still get some blind spots based on geometry and location. With 4, you can cover the whole sky. Your best telescope can only be as good as the second best telescope you have, requiring both to be observing the same object at the same time. So having one that is especially good does not help unless you get a second one up to the same level.

[@martinhuhn7813]

@@kurtilein3 Thanks.

[@darthjarwood7943]

Could these black holes be collapsing/compressing our 3rd dimension into the 2nd dimension?

[@Ava31415]

Could you not use 100 off some sort of Cube-Sat USB stick and reentry heat shield , with AI docking, cheap to launch, it might take a month or two to get back, but you would have a 100TB? hard drive??

[@miinyoo]

Are people collaborating to actually pull this off? People have been bantering it about for decades. Really? Dedicated money ( resources and manpower) and the vision to be able to pull it off? Thinking about it is a breath of fresh air. Actually doing it is also a breath of fresh air I'm sure for any participants who will dedicate their lives to making it happen. If they have the support to do so.

[@HughPryor]

As far as I can work out, we've *only* seen 2 fuzzy rings from the world's most powerful telescope. What other objects has the EHT looked at?

[@frasercain]

That's it. That's pretty much the limit of the telescope. That's why the next version has to go to space.

[@rushwal]

What about a radio telescope on the edge of the visible side of the moon linked with the telescopes on the earth. Then you would have a telescope with a diameter of the distance from the earth to the moon.

[@Mr_Kyle_]

50:00 hmm so there could be 50M to 1 Billion tiny black holes (2-3x mass of our sun, not primordial but just stars collapsing) in the Milky Way alone? Very interesting, not a theory for dark matter I hear talked about nearly enough, tell me more!

[@ericganz4432]

The presence of a singularity is an indication that the theory has broken down at that point

[@faker-scambait]

🏆🏆

[@triskeliand]

hoorah for legrange points

[@bjornfeuerbacher5514]

And even more for Lagrange points.

[@slo3337]

The resolution of current BH images is greatly "enhanced" with AI. Basically we told the computer what we want to see and it "interprets" the data into a variety of images and someone picks one that looks the "best". The shape you see is way more of a what we want to see than actual real image.

[@kurtilein3]

Not exactly true, or maybe only for press images, not for scientifically valuable images. It is simply a lie that general AI is used to visualize scientific images done for use in science. They build their own dedicated highly sophisticated big data systems to turn the raw data into nice pictures. If you cannot fully understand and reliably reproduce it, its not science. What general AI does cannot be fully understood and reliably replicated.

[@archmage_of_the_aether]

Why is M87 (about 53 million LY away) visible but not any supermassive black hole in any closer galaxy?

[@frasercain]

It's enormous. M87 and SgrA* are about the same size in the sky even though they're vastly different distances from us.

[@IKnowYouDidnt]

CGI keeps getting better.

[@frasercain]

We're talking about ideas for future telescopes.

[@MelindaGreen]

Have they considered having the telescope fire back hard drives?

[@batbat224]

Couldn’t they just use the new DSOC (Deep Space Optical Communications) to send data back faster?

[@jnhrtmn]

I don't think you can call it a picture when they calibrated that image one pixel at a time. A better description is that they drew that picture with their preconceived idea of what it should look like. The only reason it don't look different is they didn't calibrate it to look different. Am I wrong?

[@chuckjones9159]

The images are beautiful but not very useful. We have many unanswered questions. I would like to see the development and release of open source software capable of modelling universes even if only on a limited scale. If it was set up to allow the parameters to be changed in a simple fashion maybe some of us could play around and stumble upon a breakthrough.

[@phapnui]

What is the shape of a black hole? Flat or round?

[@frederf3227]

Spherical, perhaps squashed if it's rotating. The disk is flat. Think of like Saturn if the ball was painted black.

[@phapnui]

@@frederf3227 So no matter what direction you view it, it will remain the same image?

[@rugsthreecrows3697]

We badly need space construction.... space elevator / graphene cables, EM railgun for cargo, life extension & radiation resistance for long term space travel, and start building lots of things cheap and plentiful in space, on the moon, etc. These long term ultra-precise observatory missions are very time consuming and won't move full exploration and exploitation of the uniqueness of space (material science, theoretical sciences, new sociopolitical relationships, colonisation, etc). My entire lifetime has been about watching the snail's pace of discovery and research subjugated to capitalist motives. Money is merely a token of resource allocation. Can we please start using it to fund productivity and punish those abusing the monopoly on money issuance?

[@askani21]

Ben Hudson is super cute 😅

[@pete25901]

Glorified math geeks. Anybody that graduated grade 12 math can make videos like this and sound smart.

[@frasercain]

You should totally do it then. There's a lot of crappy science videos on KZbin.

[@artdonovandesign]

So the photon ring lives _inside_ the isco, yes?

[@frasercain]

Oh yeah. Only photons can remain in this orbit.

[@ktaylor9095]

Inflatable sunshield?

[@saulsavelis575]

0:17 you see 3 starts orbiting around a common centre, NOT BLACK HOLE

[@frasercain]

Whatever that thing is, it has 4.1 million times the mass of the Sun and it's invisible.

[@eljeorgo]

Aye guys.... I'm not a physicist.... Community college over here.... But try to "defeat this logic" (And I am probably wrong here - but CLOSE) The "photon ring" has to almost DIRECTLY HUG the event horizon, the photon ring is a CIRCULAR ORBIT of photons going lightspeed (although THIS is not exactly true... Because there might be a little "gas" around the event horizon, and f a photon hits even just 1 hydrogen atom it's speed will alter.... Anyway circular orbits right? If yer farther away from the event horizon, yer photon escapes in an eliptical orbit that..... Gets bigger &bigger kinda like our moon is slowly escaping earth.... If it's any closer... The photon(s) "spiral in" to the event horizon... So the photon ring DIRECTLY HUGS the evnt horizon (within one "photon width"... [And I don't think photons HAVE a "width" although they SHOULD... because of "polarization" which to my mind means they are "spiraling around" some "center point axis... Like... if a "thing" can somehow be "turned 90 degrees"... doesn't it have a "width" then?].) I'm probably combining "classical & quantum" up there.... But the photon ring should almost directly hug the event horizon FOR A NON-SPINNING BLACK HOLE (Which likely don't actually exist).... If yer black hole is SPINNING..... You'll have to ask Roger Penrose where yer photon ring is.... But for idealized "non-spinners" -That ring should directly hug the horizon.

[@sandpitwtfover]

The only place you will find faster than speed of light…..

[@sspoonless]

I wish KZbin would separate the thumbs up/down between #1 whether I like a video, & #2 whether I want the algorithm to shower me with more that it thinks are similar. Sometimes I see a spectacular video that I just love, but have to give it a thumbs down to discourage the algorithmic misunderstanding.

[@frasercain]

What's the solution?

[@lonzobamin]

welll it literally just looks like a magnet under a ferrocell this is not surprising though.

[@williamkelley1783]

I don't know if it's just that I've grown and become jaded, but I just don't find black holes that attractive anymore.

[@TheGreatSilas]

Ben Hudson looks a LOT like Chris Evans....

[@doncarlodivargas5497]

What we should do was collect the light emitted from earth, reached a black hole, orbitted the black hole and returned back to us, seing how earth was in the past, perhaps even from different black holes seing earth at different times back in an other time

[@seasonedbeefs]

Ooh nice idea

[@doncarlodivargas5497]

​@@seasonedbeefs - yes, don't you think? Pretty sure there is a Nobel prize waiting for the astronomer taking that picture

[@frasercain]

There just aren't a lot of photons making that return journey. And you'd need to be able to resolve details of the Earth's surface from twice the distance to the black hole. Details... I know.

[@stevenbliss989]

2 is NOT enough, you MUST have 3 minimum for 3D ability!

[@AliHSyed]

Why do we assume Hawking radiation is real even though it’s never been observed?

[@bjornfeuerbacher5514]

Because it has actually been observed in _model_ systems, which mimic actual black holes.

[@seditt5146]

@Fraser Cain I love the EH picture but there is a huge problem I noticed from the start and it starting to seem like there are small whispers starting to appear echoing my sentiment. It WILL ALWAYS prove our theories of relativity because the picture is made by training AI algorithms on what we would expect to see if given a specific set of data. As a programmer I suspect you have a bit more insight about this than many and I am curious what your thoughts are on this. We are creating a self fulfilling algorithm and we know AI can "Hallucinate" answer's as they are now calling it. It really does not matter what data you put into this thing its going to spit out a blackhole picture exactly how you trained it and while yes, there is TONS of information we can gather if our model which we trained it are correct. If not we are going to push forward down the wrong path. Due to the fact our standard models only predict 4 or 5% of all matter and energy its obvious our models are wrong on a grand scale and when discussing something like a Blackhole, which is where the other 95% of matter and energy start to come into play, it means we are ignoring that we are attempting to test our models simply by training AI to spit out exactly what we expect it to produce. Any chance you can get an expert on to refute my claims here because I really REALLY want them refuted but as time goes on it seems more and more correct. The pictures are simply "Fake" products of data feed into a trained algorithm. Can we see the product of totally random information coming out of this AI please to ensure it produces garbage and not what I am almost sure it will produce which is simply a random picture of a Blackhole. Its problematic at best and fraudulent at worse.

[@kurtilein3]

It is simply not true. The raw data is being combined and analyzed by dedicated, custom made software and processes that follow scientific requirements. So these systems are 1. Understandabe and transparent and 2. The results can be replicated by doing the same thing again as described in the publications. You may see exaggerated images in the Media which are mostly done by journalists themselves, and there may be general AI used in these, but this does not happen in science. It needs to be falsifiable and verifiable, understandable and replicable, and AI is not that. You simply exit science for some other place, like maybe media or new media, if you use what cannot be reliably verified.

[@seditt5146]

Its being analyzed by a Neural network designed to process the data and that Neural network was trained to produce results for size...spin, shape etc using our current models of relativity and blackholes. I have read the papers. The pictures you have been seeing are simply one interpretation by the Neural networks and yet its being neglected that these AI can spit out a multitude of various images depending on extremely minor variations. You have to have some idea on the workings of Neural networks to fully understand what I am saying here. Not throwing shade or whatever you want to call it I am simply pointing out the fact that the processing is being done by AI that pretty much can ONLY spit out images that correspond to our current models. Its just how it is as humans are not really involved as much as you seem to think. I mean they are... but there is simply too much data and the AI has to work with it and it is trained via our models so we have a catch 22 that i personally dont know how we can fix it. @@kurtilein3

[@seditt5146]

"You simply exit science for some other place, like maybe media or new media, if you use what cannot be reliably verified." Yup, we are sort of on the same page there but you don't seem to understand the side you are taking is the Media and New media... Not the science which is the fact these AI work in a specific way. I know because I have written them and studied the hell out of them. There is nothing really transparent about them as you say other than training data as they are commonly referred too as Blackboxes although that's kind of incorrect as we do have means of examining individual neurons but that is something else altogether. @@kurtilein3

[@deltalima6703]

Just go to sag a* and take some selfies with an iPhone. Done and done. :)

[@theforlanjoker4457]

Dude get a yeti mic there really not that expensive

[@hive_indicator318]

I don't do this, but someone telling a stranger to spend money is so rude. And making sure you're using the right word while being an ass is free. *they're

[@MajorPayne175]

This superficial observation doesn't even peel back one layer of the onion. Were you able to properly consume the information or did you get held up at the means he chose to convey the info?

[@tonytaskforce3465]

Couldn't follow him. Lots of muttering and murmuring.

[@silberlinie]

Ben Hudson, again one of the unfortunates who are banished by their wives to the hallway, sometimes even to the basement, to pursue their hobbies. Tragic.

[@digbysirchickentf2315]

Photoshop update downloaded.

[@Raz.C]

Sorry, Fraser. I just couldn't watch this one. I found Ben's answers both frustratingly vague as well as crotch-punchingly repetitive. I pulled the plug after only 15 minutes. Sorry, mate.

[@frasercain]

We get into the details at about that point, I think you'd find it's much better after that. He's an engineer not a physicist.

[@Ghryst]

bro, wash your clothes, like a civilised person. you're on camera, not radio

[@dr.merlot1532]

That makes no fking sense. There should not be a photon ring with a clear dark spot in the middle. Photons should be able to hit the center of the camera/detector.

[@Chyrre]

You are right, but these photons miss the Earth, only the ones coming straight at us do we see. Think of the Earth almost infinity far away from the black hole, so almost a photon having any deviation from a straight line to us will not be seen

[@Chyrre]

In fact you will see a ring like this from any angle (ie. some aliens watching the black hole from their vantage point will also see a ring)

[@ironmanmark55stark15]

Um mabe it’s the way to the other side