Hawking Radiation is NOT Random
Quantum information theory has now allowed physicists to solve the 50 year old black hole information paradox. When a black hole emits Hawking radiation, the emitted particle is entangled with its partner particle that gets sucked into the black hole, so what happens to all the information carried by the particles when the black hole finally radiates itself away? Hawking's work suggested two conflicting conclusions:
1) Black holes evaporate all their information away in their radiation.
2) The radiation does not carry information.
If the work described in this recent article in Quanta magazine holds up to further scrutiny, it is a triumph for the group of young physicists involved and the theory of quantum computation. It is also a body blow to the physicists' false 20th century God of randomness – the new solution to the paradox requires that a black hole's radiation is NOT as random as Hawking had found.
"Inside of a black hole, the two theoretical pillars of 20th-century physics appear to clash. Now a group of young physicists think they have resolved the conflict by appealing to the central pillar of the new century – the physics of quantum information."
Quanta magazine is free to read and the article may be downloaded as a .pdf file.