I'm curious: were you also asked about the point of it once the initial awe subsided? Almost every non-physicist I know was absolutely convinced that both GR and black holes were already confirmed/complete, which made me wonder where they got the idea in the first place.
Hah, actually, nobody asked me nothin' this time around. Which was kinda nice. We do have many confirmations of GR, like the precession of Mercury's perihelion, twin paradox experiments using atomic clocks, required GPS corrections, and so on. But the idea that we shouldn't continually constrain things both experimentally and theoretically is silly. Besides, the space near black holes is such an extreme environment that it's one of the best opportunities to see if GR breaks down. Of course the first blurry images from something only several microarcseconds wide are gonna match the models. So don't do it? That's like saying we shouldn't take the first steps towards a necessary goal because the first steps are boring (which I disagree with anyway). Too bad, you gotta lay the groundwork for better imaging in the future. And I don't think anyone asking about "the point of it" has even a vague grasp of the technical challenges already overcome by the Event Horizon Telescope team.
I suppose? After thinking about one of the longer conversations a bit more, there's also a level of "string theory expands General Relativity, so I guess that the thing it expands should be a complete picture." Guess that's a marketing problem. ;) Yup. Sorry for abbreviating it though.General Relativity (GR? Right?)
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