Laymen love black holes because they sound so menacing and make great plot points for cheap scifi, but most people don’t tend to understand them. First off, it’s not a hole. It’s a ton of mass crushed into a single point. Second, they’re not black; they’re turquoise. Thirdly, they don’t suck things into them anymore than anything else with mass. If the sun was suddenly replaced with a black hole of the same mass, the earth’s orbit wouldn’t be disturbed at all. It would just be dark and we’d all freeze to death, but otherwise we’d be fine.

One interesting property of a black hole is its the only thing we know of that destroys information because everything that goes into it gets collapsed into only three points of data: mass, charge, and angular momentum. Like if you had data you don’t want anyone else to obtain, run a wipe program and throw it in a black hole. It will be gone for good that way (unless you were trying to protect your data’s angular momentum from prying eyes). Hopefully someone has a sign up telling you where the event horizon is, though, because black holes can be dangerous that way.

Anyway, let black holes be a warning to you. We all love matter and use it every day, but sometimes it collapses on itself and rends space and time. That’s dangerous. If you see matter collapse on itself, get as far away as possible and contact your nearest scientist. And whatever you do when confronted with a black hole, don’t put your tongue on it.

Despite the existence of black holes having been calculated for some time, they’re still pretty much theoretical. I’m sure, though, there will eventually be a Mythbusters episode where Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage travel to the center of the galaxy and throw a rock at one while filming the results with a high speed camera, confirming most of the theories.

Science!