Dear Dan,
You write in your post at Emmanuel Moulay's thread:
---"In this essay we maintain that certain physical properties, originate from the fundamental nature of the universe as a whole and are not independent of it."---
The 'nature of the universe as a whole' is a meaningless concept as there's nothing outside of with respect to which it can express its 'nature' to: it has no physical reality as a whole. If with 'inside nature' we mean a consistent entirety of rules of behavior (laws of physics) and in a self-creating universe particles create each, then they at the same time create their rules of behavior, so you cannot say that one is the 'origin' of the other. If you agree that it doesn't make sense to ask what is cause of what, the particles or the laws they (force each other to) obey, then this is a tautology.
---"As I've shown in my essay, the energy from the Big Bang comes from a previous cycle of the universe"---
This doesn't solve the problem where all energy came from (if we may use the past tense here, which I don't believe), but only shifts that question to the encompassing whole in which this succession of bangs is supposed to occur.
---"Elsewhere, Emmanuel has stated that he believes that the contents rather than the container must be fundamental. I believe they are both fundamental, that's why gravity and the other three forces are so different."---
I agree: one defines, creates the other as I argue in my essay.
As to your own essay, you write
---"For any event or physical property to be defined as completely as possible within the limits of physical certainty, such an event or property must be defined with respect to the universe as a whole and is never independent of it."---
Indeed: if in a self-creating universe, particles have to create themselves, each other, then (the properties of) particles are as much the product as the source of their interactions. As they only have reality, exist to each other as far as they interact, they express and preserve their properties by exchanging energy, at the same time creating, preserving spacetime between them, the thing we call 'universe'.
---"Is there an ultimate meaning of time in nature?"---
A universe which manages to create itself out of nothing, can hardly stop creating, so if there's no time before/after/outside the universe, then it must produce time itself if it is to keep creating itself, and contains all time within. The universe doesn't then evolve as a whole, in time, with respect to some independent outside clock, but creates time as it keeps creating itself. So concepts like 'the universe as a whole' and 'cosmic time' ultimately don't mean anything. In a universe which creates itself out of nothing, the sum of everything inside of it, including spacetime and time, has to remain nil, so the universe doesn't exist, evolve as a whole: there is no time outside of it. Statements like "The mass of the Universe is 1.8x10^54 kg. The radius of the Universe is 0.95x10^26 meter." make no sense at all if there's nothing outside of it with respect to which these quantities can be expressed in interactions.
---"However, the incompleteness of GR, as currently formulated, has been extremely problematic and resolving this most intractable of primary issues is one of the fundamental goals of an acceptable theory of QG."---
If in a self-creating universe (the properties of) particles are as much the product as the source of their interactions, then the same holds for the force between them, so a force cannot be either attractive or repulsive. Since they need some kind of backbone to prevent their properties to vary continuously as the circumstances vary, to have properties and a fixed energy, to be stable within a certain energy interval, their properties and rest energy must be quantified. If particles are as much the source as the product of their interactions, then so is the force between them, so a force cannot be either attractive or repulsive. This means that though particles, within the conditions they can exist, are stable, may act as if they either attract or repulse, as their rest energy also is the product of their interactions, they have no 'bare' mass or charge which can give rise to infinite interaction energies at infinitesimal distances, and hence there's no need for string theory. Since the mass of particles similarly is the cause as well as the effect of their interactions, of their energy exchange, we need no Higgs particles either. It is our assumption that particle properties only are the source their fields and interactions which leads to these infinities. If we accept that particles, their properties also are the product of their interactions, of an evolution, then it is easy to see that the unification problem is an artificial, unnecessary problem of our own making. The weak gravity which causes so much problems in present physics is just the effect (or cause) of the continuous creation process of a self-creating universe. The chief culprit of today's mess in physics is the Big Bang fairy tale: the assumption that particles only are the source of their interactions, that they passively have been created by some outside intervention. For details see my essay.
Regards, Anton.