Alt text:
If you live in Los Angeles (around 33ยฐ52'N, roughly the latitude of Hermosa Beach) the black hole in V404 Cygni passes over you each day. On Christmas Day it will be directly overhead around 2pm.
this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2023
508 points (99.2% liked)
xkcd
8848 readers
281 users here now
A community for a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Probably, yeah. Definitely can't be good for them. I'm not a biologist, but I encourage anyone reading this to chime in! What happens to cave-dwelling creatures when brought out into the sun for an extended period?
I didn't make it clear in my original comment, but in my head I imagined a race whose explorers swore off venturing into the darkness after the first few disappearances. Maybe some folklore emerged, and they assumed that "that place" and death are intrinsically related. Then, as their tech became more advanced, they gained the ability to scrutinize the other planets in their star system. Imagine the horror when they see "death" wandering along the surface (rather, the surface moving through it) and they have no clue why theirs isn't moving.
Is it merely asleep?
This was a fun thought experiment. Thanks for getting my brain churning! I'd love to read someone's expansion on this idea, if anyone else finds it fascinating. At this point in the lore, I can see religions being born to try and appease Death, or at least prolong its slumber in the frozen hemisphere while they search for answers. Wars are fought, nations fall, yada yada... Maybe it's best not to draw too many parallels with our own world ๐