Cosmic Origins, Inflation, Dark Energy, and the Hubble Tension: A Single Fabric Account of the Universe

Conventional cosmology has accumulated patches over five decades to keep ΛCDM working against observation. Each is a structural addition introduced to handle a specific failure of the empty-space ontology. The patches have not converged. The Hubble tension stands at 4–6σ. The cosmological constant problem remains the largest discrepancy between theory and experiment in physics. Temporal Congestion Mechanics dissolves these problems structurally through a single mechanism. The fabric is a physical medium with finite mechanical properties. The universe began at the medium's structural maximum compression n = n_H = √e, finite throughout, no singularity. Every observable feature of cosmic history is the continuous relaxation of n from n_H back toward 1. The same relaxation, governed by one Master PDE acting on one field, produces: The cosmic initial state structurally derived, not postulated. The three structural problems inflation was introduced to solve dissolved without invoking an inflaton field. The hot early universe behaviour matched in the frozen-fabric regime. The transition to acceleration at z_t ≈ 0.55 derived from one threshold density. Late-time cosmic acceleration derived: w₀ ≈ −1 + 8 × 10⁻⁴, dw/dz > 0 unconditional. The cosmological constant problem dissolved. The Hubble tension explained structurally through τ(ρ) and environmental relaxation. Multiple other ΛCDM tensions addressed by the same apparatus. The future bounded: coasting expansion, not eternal de Sitter. The past bounded: finite z_max, no singularity. The framework introduces no new parameters for cosmology. The same apparatus that produces gravitational, galactic, and particle-physics predictions in companion papers produces these cosmological predictions. The structural pattern across the framework is cross-domain consistency: one mechanism, one PDE, observables matching across all domains. The conventional empty-space ontology has accumulated decades of patches because it lacks a structural account of what space is. Once the substrate is recognised as a finite, dynamical medium governed by one partial differential equation, the patches dissolve into the medium's actual behaviour. The framework's claim is that this reframing is correct — that the universe is what TCM says it is — and that the cross-domain match across cosmic origins, inflation, dark energy, the Hubble tension, and the additional tensions addressed here is the structural evidence for that claim.