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

[spike at rainier66.com]

> ...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
>
> _______________________________________________




-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of Kelly Anderson ...

>...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




Kelly the black holes that form at the centers of galaxies are millions of solar masses, not hundreds.  Even if it is two black holes that formed in separate galaxies, it is still quite mysterious how all that angular momentum was dissipated to allow for a merger.  If two hundred-some black holes somehow formed when initially at rest with each other, they would pass by each other with such enormous velocity they would be most unlikely to form an orbit which could somehow burn off all that momentum in space-time distortion.  Our current models don't explain it.

spike