It is shown that space curvature can be disposed of by properly taking into account gravitational self-energies. This leads to a parameter-free modification of Newton’s law, violating Gauss theorem, which accounts for the crucial tests of gravitation in a flat space. Strong gravitational fields entail opposing big gravitational self-energies. The negative gravitational self-energy of a gravitational composite object, which results in a mass defect with respect to the sum of the constituents, thus cancels out the latter at the Schwarzschild radius. Hence a black hole, possible end result of the radiative shrinkage of a star, having zero total energy, cannot any longer interact with other objects. Baryon number non-conservation may result.
