THE HUBBLE CONSTANT, EMPIRICAL INDEPENDENCE, AND MODAL COSMOLOGY

This article presents an expanded critical–propositional analysis of Wendy L. Freedman et al.’s 2019 study, “The Carnegie–Chicago Hubble Program. VIII. An Independent Determination of the Hubble Constant Based on the Tip of the Red Giant Branch,” published in The Astrophysical Journal, in systematic dialogue with the Theory of Objectivity (TO) developed by Vidamor Cabannas and Denivaldo Silva. Freedman et al. constructed an independent local distance ladder based on the Tip of the Red Giant Branch (TRGB), calibrated Type Ia supernovae, and obtained H0 = 69.8 ± 0.8stat ± 1.7sys km s−1 Mpc−1 . Their determination was intermediate between the Planck inference under the base six-parameter ΛCDM cosmology and the Cepheid-based SH0ES determination available in 2019. The study is therefore especially relevant to questions concerning ob- servational independence, calibration, model dependence, cosmic expansion, systematic uncertainties, and the epistemological distinction between empirical regularities and theories of cosmic origin. The analysis developed here argues that Freedman et al. neither prove nor directly falsify the modal axioms of TO. In TO, the Seven Absolute Truths are proposed as modally necessary ontological propositions, whereas a measurement of the Hubble constant is an empirically contingent description of an already existing universe. The sci- entifically productive relationship between these domains must therefore occur through operational bridges: axioms must generate derived propositions; derived propositions must enter physical models; physical models must yield quantitative predictions; and those predictions must then be confronted with independent observations. Particular attention is given to the First Absolute Truth, according to which prior to the universe there was Nothing, understood not as absolute nonbeing but as an eternal logical and mathematical essence; the Second Absolute Truth, which attributes to every existing element a magnetic field proper and exclusive to itself; and the Fifth Absolute Truth, according to which logical existence requires an element to be observed by, or to lie within the frequency relation of, at least two other elements, without any requirement for human observation. The article also examines the TO conception of the transcendent element as knowledge or information produced in atomic relations and held to be equivalent to atomic radiation. The strongest dialogue with Freedman et al. concerns the physical transport of information by radiation, the objective and non-anthropocentric chain of interactions involved in astronomical observation, the role of physical boundaries in the TRGB phenomenon, and the independent empirical determination of cosmic expansion. A possible relation is also examined between the measured expansion rate and the Expansive Inducing Effect and Centrifugal Era proposed in TO. Such a relation, however, remains phenomenological until TO derives its own quantitative function HTO(z). The article concludes that Freedman et al. provide substantial empirical material with which TO can enter operational contact, but do not constitute a direct experimental confirmation of its modal ontology. Their greatest significance for TO is methodological: any alternative cosmology derived from TO must reproduce, explain, or predict the distance–redshift relations independently constrained through TRGB stars, Type Ia supernovae, gravitational-wave standard sirens, CMB-based inference, BAO, and other cosmological probes. The proposed dialogue is therefore one of constrained compatibility and potential indirect corroboration rather than retrospective confirmation. Keywords: Theory of Objectivity; Hubble constant; Hubble tension; TRGB; cosmic distance ladder; modal ontology; cosmology; information; radiation; cosmic expansion; operational testability; Freedman; empirical corroboration.