I am a structural philosopher, Douglas, and I will not go against scientific data, but I am looking at the mechanical big picture first. Whatever we come up with, it has to make sense from a mechanical perspective.

Can I interest you in this story:

Two Closed Systems, Not One.

It begins with energy always existing in a closed system, so there is never any extra energy (nor a loss). But we can have the original closed system pushing out a secondary closed system, right? It then diminishing its own primary closed system, but overall the two systems show no loss or gain.

https://medium.com/@fred-rick/two-closed-systems-not-one-3d66da5b8dff