&gt; the whole collection is held together by the strong nuclear force<p>to be pedantic, the &quot;lots of gluons and q-antiq pairs&quot; <i>is</i> the strong nuclear force in action<p>Also, you&#x27;re talking about virtual particles here, it&#x27;s acceptable to (and usually this is done) ignore them when describing the &quot;contents&quot; of a particle since they&#x27;re everywhere (in less concentration perhaps) anyway.<p>But yeah, those particles are there.