Cosmological Implications of Thermodynamic Split Conjecture

Abstract

Building on initial work on the Thermodynamic Split Conjecture (TSC), which posits that black hole and cosmological horizon thermodynamics are generically inequivalent, we examine the consequences of that split for the Gibbons Hawking temperature and its role across cosmology. We consider many key results in both early and late universe cosmology and show that many important results such as those governing eternal inflation, vacuum tunneling, quantum breaking and primordial black holes can change. The analysis further reveals that small, TSC motivated corrections to horizon thermodynamics can subtly modify Friedmann dynamics, potentially helping to address the $H_0$ and $S_8$ tensions. The work thus provides a unified route from quantum gravity motivated thermodynamics to observational cosmology and motivates dedicated tests of the thermal laws governing the Universe itself.