[pdonis]

> If the interpretation were wrong, and that's not a force, then the amount of force in that equation would be 0.

With no force, Gm₁m₂/r² = 0.

Nonsense. The GR interpretation is that G m1 m2 / r^2, when it is nonzero, is describing an effect of spacetime geometry, not a force. It can't be a force in GR because it isn't felt; an object moving solely under the influence of G m1 m2 / r^2 feels no weight--an accelerometer attached to it reads zero. GR does not change the numerical value of G m1 m2 / r^2 at all. It just reinterprets what the quantity represents.

[lazide]

This is the bookkeeping/accounting part of it, BTW.

It clearly exists (as a thing).

What we decide to call it, and how we account for it, while important, doesn't make it not exist in reality.

Despite the motte and bailey argument to the contrary.