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So, I'm bopping along in a completely flippant, fun YA series, but it all comes screeching to a halt in the fourth book of the series, The Ghosts of Ashbury High. Mind you, I don't think they expected that the seemingly wild rantings of one of the narrators would do much but amuse or perhaps confuse some of the readers, but they hit upon one of my more... sensitive spots.
Black Holes.
Yes, it sounds silly, perhaps. But they are weirdly unexplainable and that which (or should it be another 'that', there?) we know about them is terrifying. Not just the 'being stretched into a noodle as you near the event horizon' part, which, admittedly, would sting a bit.
No, my fear (and morbid fascination) stems more from the warping of time. I still vividly remember a conversation I had with my father when I was... young, maybe middle school? About what would happen as you neared the event horizon (it had something to do with snapping your fingers). How your perception of time would be markedly different than the perception of time of those outside, and how it would be that, in some respects, you lived on at the event horizon forever, at least to them, though not for you. So, I suppose that would be achieving a sense of immortality, in your death as much as your life, though, so.
Stargate SG-1 had as episode that touched on it, when there was a team running for their life towards a Stargate and the people on Earth saw them frozen in time.
Time, which is such a constant (the last hour of the workday seeming to take forever notwithstanding) to be so... fickle. That terrifies me.
Black Holes, the ultimate unknown. Nothing can be known about them, because nothing can escape. Sure, you can fantasize about them being gateways to other worlds, imagining you would somehow survive being squeeze through an opening the size of a single atom, okay, but realistically? Frozen at that last moment of panic, knowing you were going to turn into a noodle. And it happening to you, in the blink of an eye, but not.
My head hurts.
Do Pastafarians worship Black Holes? They should.
At any rate, I do actually recommend the series. It starts out a little insipidly, the first book being the worst (and by worst I mean a fun, meaningless, light-hearted romp), but they get better. I thought the third book (the Murder of Bindy Mackenzie) was quite good (and quite hard to put down) and the fourth is proving to be very hard to put down. Very well-told, very griping, and really very good.
Apart, you know, from the bits about Black Holes.
Black Holes.
Yes, it sounds silly, perhaps. But they are weirdly unexplainable and that which (or should it be another 'that', there?) we know about them is terrifying. Not just the 'being stretched into a noodle as you near the event horizon' part, which, admittedly, would sting a bit.
No, my fear (and morbid fascination) stems more from the warping of time. I still vividly remember a conversation I had with my father when I was... young, maybe middle school? About what would happen as you neared the event horizon (it had something to do with snapping your fingers). How your perception of time would be markedly different than the perception of time of those outside, and how it would be that, in some respects, you lived on at the event horizon forever, at least to them, though not for you. So, I suppose that would be achieving a sense of immortality, in your death as much as your life, though, so.
Stargate SG-1 had as episode that touched on it, when there was a team running for their life towards a Stargate and the people on Earth saw them frozen in time.
Time, which is such a constant (the last hour of the workday seeming to take forever notwithstanding) to be so... fickle. That terrifies me.
Black Holes, the ultimate unknown. Nothing can be known about them, because nothing can escape. Sure, you can fantasize about them being gateways to other worlds, imagining you would somehow survive being squeeze through an opening the size of a single atom, okay, but realistically? Frozen at that last moment of panic, knowing you were going to turn into a noodle. And it happening to you, in the blink of an eye, but not.
My head hurts.
Do Pastafarians worship Black Holes? They should.
At any rate, I do actually recommend the series. It starts out a little insipidly, the first book being the worst (and by worst I mean a fun, meaningless, light-hearted romp), but they get better. I thought the third book (the Murder of Bindy Mackenzie) was quite good (and quite hard to put down) and the fourth is proving to be very hard to put down. Very well-told, very griping, and really very good.
Apart, you know, from the bits about Black Holes.
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And by PROVED!!!!! I mean "this machine kept beeping! proof!". :p
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BECAUSE THAT IS TOTALLY SCIENTIFIC AND PROOF-LIKE!
Science is a bitch. I love her, but man, it's a love-hate relationship. I'm also very tired, but I don't think anyone will notice. It's not like I'm crazier than usual, right?
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I also have too many YouTube clips stashed away:
BLACK HOLE MACHINE (and how we all die) YAY!
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And thank you so very much for feeding into my paranoia. ;p
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See, when my dad died, he died an engineer. First, last, always, my dad was an engineer. So I figured he would never be satisfied with an afterlife of nothin' but clouds, wings, harps and choir singing. No way. My dad, he would be bored and angry within SECONDS of stepping through the pearly gates. Now, when he was alive he read all sorts of super high-concept science books. Stuff like Michio Kaku, Stephen Hawking, Schrodinger's Kittens, all that stuff. And he once told me that when he read it, he felt like he was seeing echoes of god.
Dad's dead. He ain't got no big clumsy fragile body to worry about no more. He doesn't have to be constrained by relativity no more. He can go anywhere. Not anywhere in the world... ANYWHERE. So I figure he'll spend a few dozen years checkin' out how stars and things work, maybe figure out like, nebulas and stuff. But one day he'll light upon the ultimate puzzle. He'll find himself a nice black hole.... and go through it. Just to see what it does.
And it might creep you out, I dunno, but somehow I find it oddly comforting.
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And, yeah, I like the idea of one day edging up to a black hole with no worries of my physical body being stretched into a string and going "Should I? Oh, why not?!"