universal inflation (a hyper-accelerating phase of expansion in the early universe, seemingly caused by “vacuum energy” or “dark energy”). The classical Big Bang model seemed to indicate a beginning of the universe at a Hawking-Penrose singularity, but this was mitigated by the contemporary Big Bang model, which opened up the possibility of an early quantum cosmological era and an inflationary dynamic (allowing our universe to be but one amidst a multiplicity of possible universes within a theoretical