From: Vincent Cate (vcate@hpcupt1.HP.COM)
Subject: Entropy / Black Holes / Big Bangs
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Newsgroups: sci.physics
Date: 1989-08-14 15:40:38 PST

Isn't our whole universe a counterexample for the claim that you can not
escape from a black hole?

Assuming that there was a big bang, there was a time when all of 
the matter in the known universe was very close together.  At this time it
must have been one VERY BIG BLACK HOLE.  So, if we are not now part
of a black hole, doesn't this prove that it is possible for matter to 
escape from a black hole?

Since I am sure someone will say, "We are still inside the black hole",
let me also ask another question.  Assuming that our Universe is a
black hole, for any event horizon (edge of our Universe) isn't it 
theoretically possible to build a rocket with enough stages to go beyond 
that edge?  Unless lots of matter is entering our universe (or being created 
faster than destroyed in our universe), the event horizon should be at a
fixed distance from the center of mass of our Universe.  Given the
billions and billions of locations :-)  where mass is being converted to
energy, and no sign of matter from other big bangs, the event horizon
is probably not moving.

The proof that you can not get out of a black hole reminds me of the
proof that we could not send a rocket into space.  The second proof 
went something like, "There is no chemical reaction such that 1 kg 
of material can produce enough energy to lift 1 kg into space from earth."
While this statement is still true today, we send rockets into space.
The first proof goes something like, "Since you can not go faster than
light (assumption?) it is impossible to throw something fast enough 
that it would escape from a black hole".


Do black holes and big bangs reverse entropy?

It seems that a black hole is taking low level energy and concentrating it.
Does a black hole make matter out of the energy it collects?   If black 
holes were able to explode (big bangs) after getting to a certain size 
then it is not hard to posulate a "space" that has been (and will be) 
active forever.  


It seems odd to think of our big bang as anything particularly special. 
I have heard people say things like, "the laws of physics did not
take effect till after the big bang had expanded far enough to get
out of the black hole".  Why are people more willing to postulate
the suspension of all of the laws of physics than to postulate that a
theory is wrong?


PS.  I am using "universe" to mean the region of space that matter from
     our big bang is filling.