NASA Sees Hidden Structure of Neutron Star in Starquake

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There is so much to learn by the study of pulsars. This is another great tool for studying them.

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Wouldn't a neutron star's interior resemble the physical structure of a black hole?

I wouldn't think so, no. In what way are you thinking they should be similar?

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Does a black hole have any physical structure?

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None that could be described by physics (that's what event horizon means, doesn't it?).

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A superdense structure of gravitationally collapsed material. From what I'm reading, the core of a neutron star is material collapsed beyond the ability to form "normal" atomic structures. All that would seem to have been acheived in a black hole, versus a neutron star, is an escape velocity, at or above the surface, of greater than 186,000 km/s. The event horizon isn't "real" in the sense that its an object of its own, its literally a trick of light caused by gravity affecting photons. The event horizon could be ten inches or ten miles above the surface of the object, depending on its volume, density, and mass. It doesn't give us any information about the object within, and it keeps striking me as bizarre that the transition of objects beyond the density of neutron stars will result in the object in question going from a few miles across to a few microns across (as it would seem some traditional theories state).

A black hole is a physical object, there is something down under the event horizon that is causing gravity to express itself. If it were the case that matter crossing the black hole we crushed into oblivion, one, the hole would disappear, since gravity wells are the impact of matter on space-time, two, they wouldn't grow because they'd destroy whatever additional matter was crossing the horizon. It would seem foolish to assume that the matter under a black hole has reached some heretofore unknown configuration simply because it exists behind a currently impenetrable shroud of gravity. What's to stop it from simply being a more massive and dense neutron star, with whatever passes for normal physical make up of a neutron star, with no way to detect them because of the escape velocity of the object is preventing light and matter from crossing back over the threshold in a currently understandable form?

It is emitting energy in the form of Hawking radiation, that we're not currently able to make heads or tails of what its telling us about what goes on under the horizon doesn't imply we never will. It would definitely indicate that the object within is still experiencing forward motion through time because it is undergoing radioactive decay, so the idea that time stops at the event horizon can be shot down right there. Retarded and warped all to heck, sure, but still marching on.

I don't see why black holes have to be some fantastical constructs.

How come black holes exert gravity?

I'm assuming that photons cannot leave a black hole because the space around the hole is so curved that the photons appear to travel in circles instead of straight lines. Would the same hold true for gravitons? If the space is curved will the gravitons go round in circles too? Is there a gravity "event horizon". Photons have no rest mass and presumably neither do gravitons, so why don't gravitons get attracted by gravity too.

clop

If tachyons are real would they be effected by the gravity of a black hole or neutron star in the same manner? Maybe we could detect tachyons in the vicinity of these if they are the only particles capable of coming from it.

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I, too, do not think that blackholes are some mysterious Voodoo space object.

According to what I have read the gravitational field of a blackhole is a relic (fossil) of its past and not even the gravitons of a blackhole can escape the gravity because gravitons travel at the speed of light. This would mean that since the blackhole has undergone an "extra-physics" transition there is no explaining it - I disagree. I believe that when matter gets crushed out of existence in a blackhole then what really happens is that the matter is crushed into its elemental form: energy. The energy is self-contained by its own gravity and if this is true then energy is either not the elemental building block of the universe or it is the elemental building block of the universe.

If energy is the elemental building block of the universe then there will be no anti-energy forms possible. If an anti-photon could be created and impacted with a photon then the two would self-destruct into their elemental form: gravitons. As far as I know there has never been an observance of an anti-photon which would suggest that, indeed, energy is the most basic and elemental entity of the universe.

This leads me to believe that gravity is somehow a change of spacetime and not an elemental particle of energy.

Of course if scientists discover an anti-photon and it self-destructs with a photon and this causes a burst of gravitons then I will believe that gravitons are the elemental form of the universe. If the anti-photon is just a "virtual" photon in reverse and the two annihilate into nothingness then this would mean that gravitons do not exist and gravity is merely a change of spacetime.

Doodler makes a point I've always wondered. If gravity is a function of matter and not energy, then transforming matter into energy in a blackhole would remove the gravity. Of course, I've always wondered if space-time is a function of gravity and matter which is the "medium" through which emergy propgates. This would mean that if there was no matter to create the space-time frame of reference then energy would have nothing to transit. Thus, if all matter in the universe spontaneously transitioned to energy, all space-time in the universe would also cease to exist. Turn it around backwards and you get a big bang.

I have a hypothesis (not a theory, mind you) that energy is a sine-wave, which effectively defines a circle if stationary. I'm thinking that maybe energy becomes matter by turning that propogating sine wave into a stationaty and reflexive sinewave circle, of some related size. This might mean that the building blocks, like quarks, are not spherical but ring-shaped, with different sizes, orientations and charges. some rings might nestle inside each other and appear smaller and less interactive, others might form multi-ring pseudo spheres and appear more massive or more interactive. By virtue of having physical properties these particles form a frame for other particles and energy to exist in.

It's not a rigorous idea and probably full of holes, but it might explain some things.

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But gravity is a function of energy as well as matter. As far as I can figure it is even a function of gravity; so that in a black hole (at least in a conventional representation of a black hole) the gravity itself causes more gravity. This positive feedback is what (in theory) causes a singularity, as far as I understand it.

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I have never heard the "gravity causes more gravity" statement before - do you have a source? I'd like to read it.

It seems counter-intuitive to think such - sort of like energy creates energy but then if the hypothesis is good then maybe its true. I've read a bit on blackholes but that is new to me.

I'm thinking that the key to the universe is the blackhole because they are the end of things but they are also freakishly similar to the cosmic kernel and so if we can understand the blackhole then we can delve into the beginning more comprehensively.

My hypothesis is that spacetime is created by the propagation of either matter or energy but since energy moves faster, then energy is the primary vehicle of spacetime. Matter exerts more influence on the structure of spacetime because it is "condensed" energy.

So the primary difference between blackholes and the cosmic kernel is the fact that spacetime did not exist prior to the cosmic kernel whereas for a blackhole spacetime already exists.

The propagation of energy "stretches" spacetime and, in effect, is an "anti-gravity" force. The stretching, according to my hypothesis, is a declining value as time progresses and so in the initial moments of the big bang the "anti-gravity" effect of spacetime stretching had the greatest impact which allowed the cosmic kernel to explode whereas a blackhole is forever stuck in its entropied existence because the "anti-gravity" influence of spacetime stretching is currently negligible.

Spacetime stretching is easily visualized by realizing that after one second the universe had a radius of one lightsecond and so the 2nd second of existence the universe stretched by 100% because its radius is now two lightseconds in size. The 3rd second of existence only increases the size by 50% and so on and so forth.

So technically from moment zero to any positive time value the stretching was infinite because the size of the universe at time zero was zero and therefore any increase is infinitely greater than its previous value. So a lot of percentage-wise stretching occurred from zero to one second which was the "anti-gravity" force needed to explode the cosmic kernel.

Its just my crazy hypothesis of the beginning.

My (crude) understanding of the relationship of gravity to particle matter and particle energy was that particles in matter are in a rest state, where the level of activity is low enough that its inherent gravity is dominent over its expressed energy (momentum?), where with particle energy, this relationship is reversed, where the level of expressed motion(?) that we detect as energy is enough to override the inertia caused by its gravitational attraction to other particles.

When matter is converted into energy, the particles undergo a change in state that express its potential energy in motion. But the attribute of gravity with respect to each particle remains consistent...

But as I said, I don't completely have my head wrapped around this just yet.

Afraid not. That is I did read it somewhere, but I can't find it now; I was hoping one of the cosmology gurus on this forum might be able to either confirm it or put me right.

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^
Actually, in one of the "Astronomy Cafe" books, the author mentions that gravity does indeed have gravity of its own, though it's much, much weaker than the "original" gravity. I'd have to root around for the specifics, though...

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Universe Today coverage (with some nice imagery)

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Hm...
bolded text points to the problem of incompatibility between Generel Theory of Relativity and Quantum Theory.
You can't have both on one piece of paper.
If you do that as an answer (not as a question), please clime Nobel prize.

What are the carriers of that "energy"?

I too think that black holes are mearly shrouded very heavy objects. What ever's beneath the horizon must be smaller still than a neutron star, but it doesn't follow logically that it should be a singularity. A mid-sized black hole exerts less gravitational influence on its neighbors than a supermassive black hole, it stands to reason that the matter inside is still there.
And, yes, mixing quantum theory (gravitons) and GR (warped space-time) is tricky at best and at worst can make you crazy. And, to shed my 2 cents on the gravitons acting on themselves: Do the messenger photons exchanging EM info between two particles act on each other? Or do they act on the particles being influenced only? I think its the latter...
GR/Quantum - string theory is trying to do something about this, although, I think the string theorists have missed the point of GR. And when I say that I mean, how does the massless spin-2 particle "warp" branes? In what way/dimension? etc... I don't think that's how string theory does it.
They're treating gravitons like messenger particles. Scoff, I say... scoff.
At anyrate, I'll end my armchair review of modern physics by saying I really don't know anything, I just have warped oppinions.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.

Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.