Are planet-killing black holes hiding inside your cat?

[Admin]

New research suggests that tiny primordial black holes could be hollowing out planets and passing through everyday objects, maybe even you and your cat!

Are planet-killing black holes hiding inside your cat? : Read more

 

[jdhorvat]

Why narrow the search to hollowed out minor planets? Wouldn't be easier to spot a large collapsed planet? Has such a thing /ever/ been observed? If the assumptions in this article are correct, and also you aren't finding larger collapsed planetary bodies, then you have no chance of finding smaller ones that still contain a PBH. Further, the assumption regarding the mass limitations of a planetary body that has been hollowed out by a PBE is lacking detail. The path of the PBE matters. There exist infinitely many paths which would render the planetary body largely empty and yet still maintain structural integrity- has this been considered?

 

[Unclear Engineer]

First, this is wrong:
"As you were reading that sentence, hundreds of trillions of neutrons passed through your body at near the speed of light, and you didn't feel a thing. These particles are nicknamed "ghost particles" for good reason. Maybe we could rename primordial black holes "ghost black holes" if Stojkovic is proven correct."

Hundreds of trillions of neutrons passing through your body in the seconds that it takes to read that sentence is a neutron flux rate that will kill you.

The article should have said "neutrinos" not "neutrons".

Beyond that, the idea that a particle moving at near the speed of light in a medium will only make a tiny diameter channel seems to be missing some logic. For one thing, why would it not emit Cherenkov radiation? For another, how could it not gain mass? And, why would some get trapped inside a planet, but others would not gain enough mass as they pass through to come out the far side as much bigger and more physically dangerous black holes?