Re-evaluating evidence for Hawking points in the CMB

TL;DR

This paper critically re-evaluates claims of detecting Hawking points in the CMB, finding no statistically significant evidence after accounting for ring size variations, thus challenging previous claims.

Contribution

It provides a rigorous statistical analysis that questions prior evidence for Hawking points in the CMB data.

Findings

No significant detection of Hawking points at 87% confidence level

Marginalization over ring size reduces confidence from 99.98% to 87%

Previous claims of detection are not statistically supported

Abstract

We investigate recent claims for a detection of "Hawking points" (positions on the sky with unusually large temperature gradients between rings) in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature maps at the 99.98% confidence level. We find that, after marginalization over the size of the rings, an excess is detected in Planck satellite maps at only an 87% confidence level (i.e., little more than 1$\sigma$). Therefore, we conclude that there is no statistically significant evidence for the presence of Hawking points in the CMB.