Do black holes, whose gravity is so strong that even light does not escape, persist forever and ever after they are formed? Or is there a moment when such an all-consuming goblin has absorbed so much stardust that it becomes unstable and then explodes? Mr Schepers from Brasschaat wonders this. Not out of fear of an explosion from a nearby specimen – the nearest black hole is about a thousand light years from Earth – but because he sees it as a possible explanation for the Big Bang. ‘Suppose all the matter in the universe were contained in one giant black hole, will it remain stable?’, He emails.
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