An incredible new study out of the University of California at Berkeley posits a new type of black hole that you could survive were you to fall into it, but it would totally erase your past and cause an infinite number of futures. In the world we know, it is possible to determine mathematically the future for time and space based on the beginning of the universe, but a certain type of black hole would cause this law to break down, they argue.

The paper suggests that if a person managed to fall into this kind of black hole, while it would not kill them, it would create a situation where the past is completely erased and there is an infinite number of futures. The remarkable claim, if true, would result in a tremendous breakthrough in our understanding of black holes, and raise questions about the truth of our existence as well.

Scientists have struggled with the concept of what happens were a person fall into the immense gravity of a black hole, which bends not only space but time itself. They had been able to dodge that question by suggesting the person would die some awful death before that question could be answered, but these scientists say not so.

“No physicist is going to travel into a black hole and measure it. This is a math question. But from that point of view, this makes Einstein’s equations mathematically more interesting,” says UC Berkeley postdoctoral fellow Peter Hintz. “This is a question one can really only study mathematically, but it has physical, almost philosophical implications, which makes it very cool.”