Orrin: I think I have pretty good idea of what a black hole is from all the Sci-fi novels I've

read, but I'm curious to hear your definition.

(You): A black hole is a singularity that warps or bends space time so drastically that
nothing can travel fast enough to escape its gravitational pull. So basically, it is a small
condensed object that has a large amount of mass which causes a huge gravitational
pull which can’t be escaped from.
Orrin: Einstein's theory of relativity seems to come up whenever people start
discussing black holes. Is relativity really that important to understanding black
holes?
(You): Yes, relativity is the mathematics behind how black holes warp space time so it’s
extremely important in our understanding of how objects interact with black holes.
Relativity also predicts many of the consequences of this warping, like gravitational time
dilation which is the idea that time moves more slowly the closer you are to a
gravitational field, or gravitational red shifting, which is the idea that light, as it gets
closer and closer to a gravitational force, slows down and its color appears to be slightly
more red.
Orrin: So I've heard that there's a black hole at the center of our own galaxy. Is it just a
matter of time before it sucks us all in?
(You): No, fortunately the “point of no return” for a black hole is very close to the center
of it, so our solar system will remain orbiting as normal for as long as it exists because
we orbit at a distance much further than what would be considered dangerous.
Orrin: Well, that's a relief, I guess. Still, I wonder what it would be like to fall into a black
hole ...
(You:) Well you wouldn’t enjoy it. As you get closer and closer to the event horizon,
which is the point at which nothing can escape the black hole’s gravitational pull, your
feet would experience a much stronger gravitational pull than your head, and your body
would begin to be pulled apart.
Orrin: Whoa, crazy stuff! But how do we know black holes actually exist in nature?
(You:) Well we’ve been able to take measurements of stars orbiting and interacting with
them. And through these measurements, we’ve realized that the object that these stars
are interacting with is something super massive and has a lot of gravitation pull yet is
very small. There’s no big star there or large body that we observe like we’d expect out
of such an insane gravitational field, so we realized that the only explanation for these
measurements are black holes.
Orrin: Alright, I'm convinced. So what's the most surprising thing you learned about
black holes (besides the fact that they actually exist)?
(You:) The most surprising thing I’ve learned is that the singularity at the center of a
black hole warps space time so much that time and space become infinite at that point.
It’s impossible to comprehend and goes against everything we experience in day-to-day
life. I find it fascinating that a point like that could actually exist.
Orrin: That's epic! See you around.