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Just a little cosmological question.

If virtual particles exist would they contribute to black matter mass or would the effect extend universally with a net effect of zero.
Might the increasing expansion rate of the universe be due to the crossing of a threshold beyond which the gravitational effect of the observable universe has become less than the gravitational effect of the unobservable universe beyond the cosmic event horizon of the observable universe?
Any ideas?
@Dukedog said in #1:
> If virtual particles exist would they contribute to black matter mass or would the effect extend universally with a net effect of zero.

I'm sure if we'd know what Dark Matter is then someone could answer your question. At least with "normal" matter virtual particles are contributing to their mass to a big degree (90% if I'm not mistaken).

> Might the increasing expansion rate of the universe be due to the crossing of a threshold beyond which the gravitational effect of the observable universe has become less than the gravitational effect of the unobservable universe beyond the cosmic event horizon of the observable universe?

When we apply the cosmological principle which states that the whole universe is working according to the same laws everywhere then no. It would be a very big coincidence that of all things the observable universe is supposed to be very different to the unobservable universe. We probably would also observe that the expansion rate is different, dependent on the direction we are looking. But we don't.
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Probably because Leonard's net effect on Jack Benny was zero.
One can always speculate. Maybe the strength of gravity spikes at every big bang, and slowly falls off, like the biggest, longest, slowest wave you've ever seen. Then, indeed, the gravitational influence of a possibly infinite unobservable universe would gradually increase, providing us with this 'acceleration' picture. But then it seems like we also could expect for this effect to 'wear off' over time.

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