This question has been asked a few times here in a few different ways but the answers don't quite seem to land for me. Considering the virtual particle pair; one falls in, one escapes, both become real. Okay.
But then my best understanding is that the escaping particle effectively "borrows" energy from the black hole's gravity to escape, while the trapped particle does not impart as much new mass to the hole as is lost to the "borrowed" gravity. Please let me know if I'm not getting that right.
It's the "borrowing" part I don't understand. What actually is that process, and how can gravitational energy be "borrowed;" isn't gravity a fixture produced by the core mass, independent of any new particles created outside the horizon that escape?
Essentially: Are we saying that a little of the hole's mass is lost to the particle as well, thus reducing the black hole's gravity, or that gravity and mass are interchangeable in this case? Or something else I'm just missing entirely.
If possible to answer less in terms of mathematical models and more in terms of describing physical events (as best as we can understand them so far), that would be more helpful to me as I'm still a student.
