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:: A few points. Firstly, the sentence "it is impossible to prove that no black hole exists anywhere" only makes sense 1) if you know for certain that no black holes exist or 2) it is impossible to search everywhere and you don't happen to find one in the limited places you look. Secondly, I am having trouble with the very strict definition of falsifiability. It does not seem to allow for the existence of human beings as a scientific theory i.e. I can not think of a way to show that humans do not exist. Thankfully in this part of the discussion page falsifiability is allowed a slightly more reasonable definition. On the subject of black holes, no black holes have ever been seen. They have been inferred. The inference stems from observing the gravitational affect on nearby matter such as stars. One example is of stars in the center of the Milky Way but there are others. Using simple Newtonian gravity (and Kepler's Laws), the mass of the object they are orbiting can be calculated as can the size of the volume it occupies. The implied density of matter fits with the concept of a black hole. So they "look" like black holes gravitationally. Of course, they still might not be. People need to put the effort into finding ways to falsify General Relativity and suggest alternative explanations that fit the data. Many scientific groups are trying to falsify General Relativity by measuring extreme gravitational environments such as massive binary objects. --[[User:Stuart|Stu]] 10:24 (EDT)
:: A few points. Firstly, the sentence "it is impossible to prove that no black hole exists anywhere" only makes sense 1) if you know for certain that no black holes exist or 2) it is impossible to search everywhere and you don't happen to find one in the limited places you look. Secondly, I am having trouble with the very strict definition of falsifiability. It does not seem to allow for the existence of human beings as a scientific theory i.e. I can not think of a way to show that humans do not exist. Thankfully in this part of the discussion page falsifiability is allowed a slightly more reasonable definition. On the subject of black holes, no black holes have ever been seen. They have been inferred. The inference stems from observing the gravitational affect on nearby matter such as stars. One example is of stars in the center of the Milky Way but there are others. Using simple Newtonian gravity (and Kepler's Laws), the mass of the object they are orbiting can be calculated as can the size of the volume it occupies. The implied density of matter fits with the concept of a black hole. So they "look" like black holes gravitationally. Of course, they still might not be. People need to put the effort into finding ways to falsify General Relativity and suggest alternative explanations that fit the data. Many scientific groups are trying to falsify General Relativity by measuring extreme gravitational environments such as massive binary objects. --[[User:Stuart|Stu]] 10:24 (EDT)
:::My opinion on this is twofold: if the theory states that a black hole is formed from the mass of a collapsed star, than of course there's going to be real science and real scientists involved in properly investigating this sort of thing. There are in the universe collapsed stars, quaisars, pulsars, and a very-possible black hole of this description involving the star Cygnus-X1. If, however, the theory involves something akin to "wormholes" and other things one sees in the average ''Star Trek'' episode, then that's where the pseudoscience pops in. Until it is definately-confirmed that black holes exist in fact, then the article should explain them as a theory. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 12:45, 23 June 2011 (EDT)
== Concerning escape velocity of black holes ==
== Concerning escape velocity of black holes ==