Responses to Vanamonde and damian 1727: For each, I'll enter your pseudonym, followed by the comment to which I'm labout to respond, then, on a new line, "dcl:" followed by my response. To clarify your remark, I'll occasionally enter explanatory words into your text inside square brackets.

Vanamonde: Are you sure (that a small black hole does not accelerate anything to the speed of light)?

dcl: One of the things that the special theory of relativity is famous for is that it tells us is that it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate anything to the speed of light and, once there, the accelerated object would have infinite mass. That is, it would require an infinite amount of energy to change its speed, no matter by how little. When you think about it, that's a rather amazing statement. Needless to say, that cannot be proved experimentally because it would require expenditure of an infinite amount 0f energy to prove it, and that just isn't possible..

Vanamonde: Even if it very small, if a particle enters it's [the black hole's] gravity well, it will be accelerated.

dcl: True.

Vanamonde: After all the very definition of a black hole is a gravity well that has an escape velocity greater than the speed of light.

dcl: Almost true. The escape velocity of a black hole IS the velocity of light, not greater than it. Since the velocity of light cannot be achieved by matter, matter cannot escape from a black hole.

Valamonde: Typically, a body will accelerate a smaller falling body to or near it's escape velocity unless it has a vector in a different direction.

dcl: There may be some special situations in which this may be true, but they would need to be contrived. It's not true in general.

Vanamonde: The return of the Apollo spacecraft is an example in the macroworld as they were close to the Earth's escape velocity when they re-entered the atmosphere.

dcl: I don't see return of the Apolla spacecraft as an example of a body accelerating a smaller falling body to ore near its escape velocity.

Vanamonde: Is this not true, even on the very small scale?

dcl; No.

Vanamonde: Now, I imagine that a capture virtual particle of the pair that leds to Hawking radiation will not be so accelerated as musch it "cheats" by coming into existence so close to the Schwarzschild radius.

damian1727: dcl where did copy your original pat post from i cant remember?

dcl: I didn't copy it from anywhere. I wrote it myself on my computer with myown two hands, all ten of them! In case you're wondering whether I know how to write such scientific-sounding stuff, try Googling either "Donald C. Livingston" or "The Physics of Microwave Propagation"!