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Black Holes Explained
Imagine a region in space where the force of gravity is so strong that nothing - not even light - can escape. A region with physical conditions so extreme that they have not yet been reproduced in any terrestrial laboratory. A region so dense that an object as tiny as a walnut would have the same mass as our entire planet. This phenomenon is a black hole: one of the most exotic, mind-boggling, and profound subjects in astrophysics. Nearly everyone has heard of black holes, but few people outside of complex scientific fields understand their true nature and their implications for our universe.
No movie, novel, or other fictional treatment of black holes matches Professor Filippenko's absorbing presentation of the actual science behind these amazing objects. Black holes are at the heart of some of the most intriguing phenomena in the universe. Not only that, they are ideal gateways to fundamental and cutting-edge concepts in astronomy.
No movie, novel, or other fictional treatment of black holes matches Professor Filippenko's absorbing presentation of the actual science behind these amazing objects. Black holes are at the heart of some of the most intriguing phenomena in the universe. Not only that, they are ideal gateways to fundamental and cutting-edge concepts in astronomy.
Audible Audio
Published March 11, 2019
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37 people want to read
About the author
Alex Filippenko
28 books25 followersAn American astrophysicist and professor of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley. Filippenko received a Bachelor of Arts in physics from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1979 and a Ph.D. in astronomy from the California Institute of Technology in 1984, where he was a Hertz Foundation Fellow. His research focuses on supernovae and active galaxies at optical, ultraviolet, and near-infrared wavelengths.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
December 11, 2019
This rating might be a little high. It might deserve a 3 or even a 2.... but not because it wasn't interesting... but because these lectures are really designed to be SEEN NOT LISTENED TO!! It must be like a blind person listening to a book of poems about colors. In the audio he shares videos and pictures constantly, and gives a basic description of what he is showing, but when it comes to black holes and event horizons and time warp principles seeing carries half the description at least. Enjoyable, but I want the movie version.
March 31, 2022
If you are not particularly technical and you like corny jokes you are going to LOVE this Great Courses audiobook. It is short and sweet. If you are more familiar with the issues such as I am then it will seem patronizing. Your choice.
The professor says that he explains the issues of black holes in more detail in his other Great Courses lecture: Understanding the Universe. OK. I believe that, but I'm not sure I want to know it from him.
It's a style conflict. Your mileage may vary.
I doubt I will listen to this audio course again. Maybe it is better in video.
The professor says that he explains the issues of black holes in more detail in his other Great Courses lecture: Understanding the Universe. OK. I believe that, but I'm not sure I want to know it from him.
It's a style conflict. Your mileage may vary.
I doubt I will listen to this audio course again. Maybe it is better in video.
October 13, 2019
Not nearly as good as Einstein's Relativity and the Quantum Revolution: Modern Physics for Non-Scientists.
Distracting style, jumped around a lot, sensational approach rather than educationally building.
Distracting style, jumped around a lot, sensational approach rather than educationally building.
March 23, 2024
There’s a lot of detail in these lectures, but it seems to me that some of the bigger picture questions about black holes got mentioned only in passing or passed over entirely.
While Filippenko is good at differentiating types of black holes, they all have a gravitational center. Once matter-energy breaches the event horizon, movement is direct and fast toward a singularity point. But does the black hole have a passive presence that only attracts matter and energy once it touches the event horizon, or does such gravitational pull extend beyond the event horizon (subject to the inverse square law regarding distance, relative mass and velocity)? The way Filippenko explains it, it seems to be more the former, unlike all other gravitational centers. “You don’t have to worry about getting sucked into a black hole,” he states, because we are so far away, but in the cosmic time scale is that true?
And, is there a sequence involved in galactic formation - a progressive movement and concentration of gas and dust toward the galactic center, which forms the galactic bulge, and that culminates in a black hole, and that’s the reason all galaxies are thought to have a black hole at their center? Filippenko refers, casually, both to the orbits of galaxies and to a “swirling” into the galactic center of gravity, but how it can happen both ways. The former is a stable (in a gravitational-inertial movement balance), like a solar system, whereas the latter looks to be an example of Einstein’s general theory of relativity in real time - a movement of matter and energy toward a galactic center, culminating in a black hole.
We know from star formations that matter and energy heat up as they condense and form a gravitational center, and once their nuclear fuel is used up, a solar body collapses and some explode. Why doesn’t the same process apply to the singularities of black holes? Filippenko addresses this somewhat by stating that the temperature of a black hole is inversely proportional to its mass which, I guess, means that the bigger the mass, the cooler the temperature. But that comment is at odds with what it seems should be happening - as within a solar body - when temperature increases with the gathering of mass.
Jets shooting out of black hole mergers, or pre-black hole formation, seem to be a fairly common cosmic phenomenon, but in a fundamentally important way, since massive amounts of energy shoot outward perpendicular to the accretion disk. Flippenko says the jets occur around the axis point because this is where matter and energy is least dense (versus the accretion disk), which accounts for the bipolar outflow. But why does matter and energy shoot out at all? Why doesn’t all matter and energy move inward through the event horizon and onward toward the singularity at the center? Does it have something to do with angular momentum whereby the inward movement toward the singularity has to be compensated by an outward movement, per some sort of conservation of energy principle? Also, the way Flippenko discusses jets and accretion disks for black holes raises another question: Rather than matter and energy entering the black hole from a spherical horizon, it seems that the penetration should occur only through the equatorial line (formed by spin that concentrates matter and energy) formed by the accretion disk as this is where matter and energy is most concentrated.
As others do, Flippenko depicts space-time as a “fabric” that is depressed by the presence of a black hole formed by the concentration of mass: he puts a ball on a trampoline and the latter sinks somewhat. Is this not misleading? “Fabric” is not flat as the ocean surface is flat, but surrounds a heavy gravitational body so that the inward motion is not downward, in a perpendicular way, but inward from all directions.
While Filippenko is good at differentiating types of black holes, they all have a gravitational center. Once matter-energy breaches the event horizon, movement is direct and fast toward a singularity point. But does the black hole have a passive presence that only attracts matter and energy once it touches the event horizon, or does such gravitational pull extend beyond the event horizon (subject to the inverse square law regarding distance, relative mass and velocity)? The way Filippenko explains it, it seems to be more the former, unlike all other gravitational centers. “You don’t have to worry about getting sucked into a black hole,” he states, because we are so far away, but in the cosmic time scale is that true?
And, is there a sequence involved in galactic formation - a progressive movement and concentration of gas and dust toward the galactic center, which forms the galactic bulge, and that culminates in a black hole, and that’s the reason all galaxies are thought to have a black hole at their center? Filippenko refers, casually, both to the orbits of galaxies and to a “swirling” into the galactic center of gravity, but how it can happen both ways. The former is a stable (in a gravitational-inertial movement balance), like a solar system, whereas the latter looks to be an example of Einstein’s general theory of relativity in real time - a movement of matter and energy toward a galactic center, culminating in a black hole.
We know from star formations that matter and energy heat up as they condense and form a gravitational center, and once their nuclear fuel is used up, a solar body collapses and some explode. Why doesn’t the same process apply to the singularities of black holes? Filippenko addresses this somewhat by stating that the temperature of a black hole is inversely proportional to its mass which, I guess, means that the bigger the mass, the cooler the temperature. But that comment is at odds with what it seems should be happening - as within a solar body - when temperature increases with the gathering of mass.
Jets shooting out of black hole mergers, or pre-black hole formation, seem to be a fairly common cosmic phenomenon, but in a fundamentally important way, since massive amounts of energy shoot outward perpendicular to the accretion disk. Flippenko says the jets occur around the axis point because this is where matter and energy is least dense (versus the accretion disk), which accounts for the bipolar outflow. But why does matter and energy shoot out at all? Why doesn’t all matter and energy move inward through the event horizon and onward toward the singularity at the center? Does it have something to do with angular momentum whereby the inward movement toward the singularity has to be compensated by an outward movement, per some sort of conservation of energy principle? Also, the way Flippenko discusses jets and accretion disks for black holes raises another question: Rather than matter and energy entering the black hole from a spherical horizon, it seems that the penetration should occur only through the equatorial line (formed by spin that concentrates matter and energy) formed by the accretion disk as this is where matter and energy is most concentrated.
As others do, Flippenko depicts space-time as a “fabric” that is depressed by the presence of a black hole formed by the concentration of mass: he puts a ball on a trampoline and the latter sinks somewhat. Is this not misleading? “Fabric” is not flat as the ocean surface is flat, but surrounds a heavy gravitational body so that the inward motion is not downward, in a perpendicular way, but inward from all directions.
October 29, 2024
(finished a few months ago, I'm a bit lazy to write reviews)
A very good explanation of one of the great mysteries of our universe.
One might think that what we know about black holes is not enough to fill a book - in fact a friend told me exactly this here - but actually we are already beginning to know a lot about these objects. Of course, most of the knowledge is theoretical, based on the known laws of astrophysics and on the observations we have of the universe.
As an example, the book deals with the different origins of black holes; whether they are supermassive, like the one that exists in the center of our Milky Way, with several million solar masses; or other more "modest" ones with a mass even less than our Sun. They also deal with related objects such as quasars or the gravitational waves that reach our planet (and that were measured with the LIGO experiment).
This does not prevent it from being a really enjoyable and easy to understand book. Of course, it would take one or more re-readings to assimilate all the knowledge that is presented, but a first reading (or listening, in my case it is an audiobook) already allows you to have a good notion of the phenomenon.
So, as I usually do with a book that provides me with the complete information I expected on the subject in an enjoyable and understandable way, I can only happily rate it with five stars. Congratulations to the author Alex Filippenko who is also the narrator of this audiobook.
A very good explanation of one of the great mysteries of our universe.
One might think that what we know about black holes is not enough to fill a book - in fact a friend told me exactly this here - but actually we are already beginning to know a lot about these objects. Of course, most of the knowledge is theoretical, based on the known laws of astrophysics and on the observations we have of the universe.
As an example, the book deals with the different origins of black holes; whether they are supermassive, like the one that exists in the center of our Milky Way, with several million solar masses; or other more "modest" ones with a mass even less than our Sun. They also deal with related objects such as quasars or the gravitational waves that reach our planet (and that were measured with the LIGO experiment).
This does not prevent it from being a really enjoyable and easy to understand book. Of course, it would take one or more re-readings to assimilate all the knowledge that is presented, but a first reading (or listening, in my case it is an audiobook) already allows you to have a good notion of the phenomenon.
So, as I usually do with a book that provides me with the complete information I expected on the subject in an enjoyable and understandable way, I can only happily rate it with five stars. Congratulations to the author Alex Filippenko who is also the narrator of this audiobook.
April 6, 2022
I feel bad for rating this 3 stars but it was very difficult to follow as an audiobook. You can tell it was originally created as a video because the instructor of the course keeps saying things like “as you can see here”.
Who am I kidding though? A good portion of this lecture was way over my head because I have zero background in theoretical physics or astrophysics. HOWEVER, I still really enjoyed it and want to potentially find more lectures by this instructor who came highly recommended to me… I will just need to watch his videos instead.
Anyway, thanks for Audible for making this free for a limited time. 🙂
Who am I kidding though? A good portion of this lecture was way over my head because I have zero background in theoretical physics or astrophysics. HOWEVER, I still really enjoyed it and want to potentially find more lectures by this instructor who came highly recommended to me… I will just need to watch his videos instead.
Anyway, thanks for Audible for making this free for a limited time. 🙂
February 5, 2024
All in all, I actually liked this series. The information was well laid out and well delivered. It was accessible and understandable.
That said, and this might be a personal thing, the constant shoehorning in of shockingly bad jokes and pop culture references seriously detracted from the material. And each joke was punctuated with a nervous laughter that gave away the fact he wasn't sure how it would land.
Not a massive issue, more a minor annoyance. But as I say the core content is well delivered.
That said, and this might be a personal thing, the constant shoehorning in of shockingly bad jokes and pop culture references seriously detracted from the material. And each joke was punctuated with a nervous laughter that gave away the fact he wasn't sure how it would land.
Not a massive issue, more a minor annoyance. But as I say the core content is well delivered.
September 28, 2023
These lectures made me learn much more about black holes than I did before. I was interested in black holes before I watched this, but this course filled in the gaps in my knowledge. The best part of this course is the lecturer. He is obviously enthusiastic about lecturing, uses interesting visual aids like rubber balls and cloth sheets, and will make movie references in regards to movies that get black holes completely wrong. However, this entire edition of the Great Courses is excellent.
July 4, 2022
A 4hr audio book. This was great, very detailed, highlighting known from unknown and you get a feeling that the teacher really does love his field of work. I wish I had more teachers like this. One only down side is I listened to this, to get the full experience you would have to watch the lecture, I feel gifted that I could imagine all the things shown but I fear most could not.
July 10, 2024
Very informative and fun! Some technical stuff went over my non astrophysics head. But Prof Filippenko does well to make it accessible. Took off one star as quite a bit of content is visual, which doesn't work as an audio lecture series. But still a fun listen.
July 2, 2024
Very good. Explains a lot of hard concepts very well, and understandably.
October 28, 2024
Was designed as a visual course not an audiobook, so the professor often shows stuff visually.
December 12, 2019
This is also available on DVD, which I recommend for Filippenko's worthwhile demonstrations of the more counterintuitive aspects of relativity and cosmology. His profoundly lame jokes get tiresome quickly but I found him to be informative.
October 24, 2025
Very enjoyable lectures!
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews