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Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by alixaxel on Saturday June 14, 2014 @09:39PM (#7894124)
It not the complete list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_massive_black_hole...

On a related note, I never understood how a black hole (or frozen stars like the Russians call them) could potentially orbit or be swallowed by another black hole. If they "infinitely" deform space-time, shouldn't they be unable to move at all? If time stands still past the event horizon as they say and they also rip the space-time fabric so much, they shouldn't be able to "get out of the hole". This is just too mind-bogging for me I guess.

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by wyager on Saturday June 14, 2014 @11:15PM (#7894257)
I believe black holes can be treated as normal astronomical objects outside their event horizon. The weird singularity behavior only applies within the event horizons.
Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by carljoseph on Sunday June 15, 2014 @05:33AM (#7894868)
This is pretty much true. You could replace our sun with a black hole of the same mass, and nothing would change in terms of planet's orbits.

The image of a black hole "sucking" things in like a vacuum cleaner is hugely incorrect. I think this perception comes about from the funnel image we often see representing black holes.

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by alixaxel on Monday June 16, 2014 @11:22AM (#7899519)
A black hole with the same mass as the sun wouldn't be a black hole at all, would it?
Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by deepsun on Sunday June 15, 2014 @01:23AM (#7894491)
I'm Russian, and I've never heard "frozen star". In Russian, black hole is literally "black hole".

But I greet the new legend about Russians that just born here!

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by gjm11 on Sunday June 15, 2014 @02:46PM (#7895928)
Not just born here. I've heard it before, at least 20 years ago. The version of the legend I heard is that "black hole" in Russian is (or suggests) an obscenity, so for a long time Russian physicists didn't want to use that term.

The term "frozen star" has certainly been used for black holes. If you Google both terms you'll find an article from 1971 called "Introducing the black hole", by Ruffini and Wheeler, which mentions that term. (It doesn't say anything about Russian obscenities, though.)

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by ay on Sunday June 15, 2014 @05:46PM (#7896444)
"Black hole" is not really an obscenity in Russian as much as it isn't in English.

But the paper you quoted does seem to explain the logic for this term's existence:

"The resulting system has been variously termed “continuing collapse,” a “frozen star,” and a “black hole.” Each name emphasizes a different aspect of the collapsing system. The collapse is continuing because even after an infinite time, as measured by a distant observer, the collapse is still not complete. Rather, the departure from a static configuration of Schwarzschild radius r=2m as seen by a distant observer diminishes exponentially in time, with a characteristic time of the order of 2m, or about 10 microseconds for an object of one solar mass. The box explains the purely geometrical system of units employed in general relativity. In this sense, the system is a “frozen star.”

In another sense, the system is not frozen at all. On the contrary, the dimensions shrink to indefinitely small values in a finite and very short proper time for an observer moving with the collapsing matter (see figure 3). Moreover, a spherical system appears black from outside; no light can escape. Light shot at it falls in. A particle shot at it falls in.

A “meter stick” would be let down in vain to measure the dimensions of the object. The stick is pulled to pieces by tidal forces, and the broken-off pieces fall in without a trace. In these senses, the system is a black hole"

So this seems to be an international term, and indeed both the Russian wikipedia http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A7%D1%91%D1%80%D0%BD%D0%B0%... and English-language one mention it.

Couple of other hits in search do mention that the term was used in 1960s - which probably explains the reason why it does sound a bit strange :-)

Anyway, it was fun to do this little investigation, thanks!

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by DanielRibeiro on Saturday June 14, 2014 @11:10PM (#7894250)
I wondered the same thing! This article seems to do a fine job on talking about black hole collisions: http://www.universetoday.com/13002/what-happens-when-superma...

TL;DR: blackhole mergers are really rare, because one often kicks the other out.

Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by Sniffnoy on Saturday June 14, 2014 @09:59PM (#7894154)
Also, according to that list, the central black hole of NGC 1277 is only 1/3 as large as claimed in the article, taking it out of contention entirely.
Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by oakwhiz on Saturday June 14, 2014 @10:21PM (#7894179)
What I would like to know is what happens when the two black holes collide.
Re:The Largest Black Hole in the Known Universe by autokad on Saturday June 14, 2014 @10:49PM (#7894215)
i believe stephen hawking stated that matter does/or could escape black holes, but this subject matter is beyond my expertise so i suggest you ask him.

with that being said, it would seem to me that yes, black holes can move, our milky way is not stationary, and black holes have been known to have very fast rotation speeds.