Scientific American just ran a little piece relating the fact that the mass
of the Earth is less than the sum of its parts - by the amount of the
gravitational binding energy - i.e., the potential energy lost as the parts
came together to form it, which they put in the trillions of tons magnitude.
It occurred to me to consider how this might play re a black hole. If the
gravitational binding energy were actually larger than the relativistic
mass, as is almost certainly so anywhere below the event horizon, else light
or high energy particles could escape and the event horizon wouldn't be,
then each additional item of mass coming in would actually reduce the total
mass of the black hole. But this appears to make the black hole itself
impossible....
So, my physics degree some thirty-one years old and largely unused, will
someone tell me what is wrong with my scenario, please. ;>
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