[ExI] The biggest black hole merger ever detected so far rocked the Universe

Kelly Anderson postmowoods at gmail.com
Mon Jul 14 17:47:31 UTC 2025


One likely way two massive black holes could merge is when galaxies
collide. Most galaxies have a massive black hole at their center. So I
wonder if the black hole at the center of Andromeda is expected to
merge with the Milky Way's black hole when the two galaxies collide
here in a few billion years?

-Kelly

On Mon, Jul 14, 2025 at 10:36 AM spike jones via extropy-chat
<extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of
> BillK via extropy-chat
> Sent: Monday, 14 July, 2025 9:23 AM
> Subject: [ExI] The biggest black hole merger ever detected so far rocked the
> Universe
>
> The biggest black hole merger ever detected so far rocked the Universe The
> gravitational waves they emitted were fiercely powerful, but where did the
> black holes come from?
> Philip Plait     July 14, 2025
>
> <https://badastronomy.beehiiv.com/p/the-biggest-black-hole-merger-ever-detec
> ted-so-far-rocked-the-universe-dc6b8bba789d58bd>
> Quote:
> In the last few orbits before they merge, taking just a fraction of a
> second, they create a blast of waves that can be incredibly powerful.
> These waves march across the Universe, and flow over Earth.
> When that happens, spacetime itself contracts and expands.
> The effect is small; over an object the size of Earth the stretching is only
> a few times the size of a proton!
> ---------------------
>
> But LIGO can detect it.  Isn't science marvellous?
> BillK
> _______________________________________________
>
>
>
> Isn't it cool?  The astronomy sites are buzzing about this.  I recall when
> they received the signal and told us what it looked like, but they would
> need some time to analyze and verify it.  I had a hard time believing two
> black holes of that size could find each other.  It strains my imagination
> trying to figure out how those monsters would form, never mind how they
> would get close enough together to dissipate all that angular momentum and
> merge.
>
> Well somehow they did.  There's still plenty we just don't understand about
> the origin of the universe.  Rather there is plenty that I don't understand.
>
> spike
>
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