Hello folks!
I was not surprised, and a bit sad when I’ve noticed that no one on “Lebanese” social media, commented/posted/mentioned about the last discovery.
<sarcasm>
If a stupid-non-talented-celebrity shat a rainbow, Lebanese will go mad about it! But the greatest discovery of this century is bull.
</sarcasm>
I’ll try to share my knowledge in a plain simple English.
What are gravitational waves?
Until 2016, GW were just a theory. A hundred year ago, Albert Einstein, in his general relativity predicted their existence.
So what the hell are they?
GW are simply “energy waves” – Almost same concept as seismic waves- caused by the gravity. Gravity ripples space time and propagates energy through “waves”.
Imagine throwing a rock into water:
The water is the spacetime.
The rock is the “gravity”.
The cool little small waves are in fact, the gravitational waves.
Why are they important?
GW travel at the speed of light! (300000KM/S)
Building more GW-detector will let us study more the secret of our universe. And maybe see beyond the Big-Bang or even inside blackholes. (GW is not light, it’s pure gravity energy)
Maybe in the future GW can be used for communication. Not necessary in our planet. But if future generation plan to build colonies outside earth. Communication are going to be much faster.
In a nutshell: Scientists can reset their counters and start observing and studying the universe from new perspectives.
For more information about the subject and how it was detected check
LIGO website news.