USSFT Paper XV: Black Holes, Horizons, and Information. Scalar-Tensor GR Recovery and the Entropic Bounce

We study black hole physics within the Unified Space-Time and Scale-Dependent Field Theory (USSFT). Working in the Einstein-frame scalar-tensor reduction established in Paper XII, we prove that the scalar field is exactly frozen (Phi = Phi_0) on any Ricci-flat vacuum background, under standard stationary boundary conditions (regular at the future horizon and approaching Phi_0 asymptotically), including the exterior of Schwarzschild and Kerr black holes. This guarantees that USSFT reproduces all standard general relativity predictions -- photon rings, innermost stable circular orbits, gravitational lensing, Shapiro delay, and ringdown frequencies -- with corrections controlled by a single small parameter epsilon = (L_SRI/ell_curv)^2, which is much less than 1 at all astrophysical horizons (e.g., epsilon approximately 10⁻⁷⁸ for a 10 solar mass black hole). In the interior of collapsing matter, where Tmu nu is nonzero and typically the trace T is nonzero (so R is nonzero), the SRI higher-derivative term activates at Planck density and is expected to halt gravitational collapse. Combined with the thermodynamic drive from near-minimum local multiplicity states, this produces an entropic bounce -- a single explosive rebound rather than a singularity. We derive the Hawking temperature as a consistency inheritance from the EFT regime, establish the parametric entropy scaling S proportional to A/L_SRI^2 from lattice microstate counting, and identify falsifiable cross-checks between the entropy coefficient and the USSFT parameter dictionary. For the information paradox, we state explicitly what USSFT can and cannot currently claim, and provide a concrete deliverables checklist for future work. Observational signatures include consistency with current gravitational-wave and black hole shadow measurements, a prediction that some non-repeating fast radio bursts may originate from primordial black holes completing their entropic bounce, and specific near-Planck corrections that could produce gravitational-wave echoes. All claims carry explicit status labels: (A) axiom/definition, (B) derived, (C) conjecture requiring future work. This is the fifteenth paper in the 18-paper USSFT technical series; it builds on the gravitational sector of Paper XII (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19689591) and the lattice framework of Paper I (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19622931). For a conceptual overview, see Paper 0 (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17852167, published in Int. J. Quantum Found. 12(2), 667-718, 2026).