Process Ontology and Dissolution of Traditional Metaphysical Problems

Process Ontology and Dissolution of Traditional Metaphysical Problems

1. Foundational Axiom

Physical reality exists.
This is the only primitive assumption. All further commitments derive from it.

2. Ontological Commitments

O1. Process Primacy

Reality is composed of processes—causally organized, temporally extended patterns of change.
There are no substances, essences, or ontologically primitive “things.”

O2. Aspectual Realization

All higher-level types (biological, cognitive, phenomenological, social, mathematical) are aspects of physical processes.
An aspect is not an additional entity; it is a mode of access to the same underlying structure.

O3. Type Structure

A type is defined by causal/explanatory structure observable at a given scale and mode of inquiry.

O4. Reality Criterion

A type or process is real if and only if it is grounded in physical processes through aspectual realization.

O5. Type Pluralism

One physical process may simultaneously instantiate multiple irreducible types.
Irreducibility is epistemic, not metaphysical.

O6. Explanatory Autonomy

Each type has its own valid explanatory vocabulary.
Cross-type translation always loses information.

O7. Access Dependence

Different types require distinct epistemic modes:

  • first-person (phenomenological)
  • third-person (empirical/scientific)
  • formal (mathematical/structural)

No single access mode yields the complete structure.

O8. Scale Relativity

Types emerge from viewing processes at different temporal and spatial scales.
Scale determines what causal structure becomes salient.

3. Boundary Principles

B1. Boundary Realization Principle

Boundaries are scale-dependent invariants within processes.
A boundary is not a line—it is a persistent structural pattern.

B2. Boundary Levels

  1. Physical: energy/matter flow constraints (e.g., cell membrane)
  2. Cognitive: inference and prediction closure
  3. Phenomenological: self/world experiential distinction

Boundaries are real, but only as structural features at particular scales.

4. Phenomenological Aspect Criteria

A process has phenomenology only if it satisfies:

  1. Integrated causal architecture
  2. Self-modeling (recursive representation)
  3. Counterfactual depth (alternative-state evaluation)
  4. Temporal binding (extended present)
  5. Boundary maintenance

These are necessary and jointly sufficient.
This avoids panpsychism and grounds consciousness in observable structure.

5. Mathematical Aspectuality

M1. Mathematical Aspectuality Principle

Mathematical structures are aspectual descriptions of possible causal relations in physical processes.

Consequences:

  • Math is real but not independent of physical processes.
  • If all physical processes ceased, math would not “exist” as an instantiated type.
  • Mathematical discovery = identification of invariants in process-structure.

No Platonism, no nominalism—mathematics is the structural logic of process-space.

6. Implications for Key Domains

6.1. Self

The self is a multi-level regulatory process:

  • biological self: metabolic continuity
  • cognitive self: predictive coherence
  • phenomenological self: experiential unity
  • narrative self: temporal integration

The self is real as process, not substance.

6.2. Free Will

Free will = policy-selection process within a predictive regulatory architecture.

  • Third-person: deterministic computation
  • First-person: experience of choosing

These are co-aspects of one process; no contradiction, no metaphysical gap.

6.3. Consciousness

Consciousness is the phenomenological aspect of processes instantiating the five architectural conditions.

  • Not produced by physics
  • Not reducible to physics
  • Not separate from physics

The “hard problem” dissolves because it presupposes a production relation that does not exist.

6.4. Mental Causation

There is no separate “mental cause.”
Mental events are phenomenological descriptions of physically instantiated causal processes.
No interaction problem, no dualism, no epiphenomenalism.

6.5. Illusions

Illusions are not unreality; they are real cognitive processes with atypical causal embedding.
They differ by type, not by ontological status.

7. Dissolved Problems

Process ontology eliminates metaphysical pseudo-problems created by substance assumptions:

  • mind-body interaction
  • production of consciousness
  • free will paradox
  • self as essence
  • mental causation gap
  • persistence of identity
  • epiphenomenalism
  • eliminativism
  • panpsychism

All of these arise from the wrong ontological category.

8. Reformulated Questions (Tractable Versions)

Traditional Question Reformulated Question
How does the mind interact with matter? How do phenomenological and physical aspects map onto one causal process?
What am I? What scale-relative patterns constitute personal continuity?
Do I have free will? What is the architecture of policy-selection?
Is consciousness physical? What physical processes instantiate phenomenological aspects?

9. Empirical Interfaces

Artificial Intelligence

AI consciousness = architectural criterion, not metaphysical category.

Ethics

Moral status depends on capacities (phenomenology, agency, narrative depth), not substance.

Psychology

Disorders = dysregulated process architectures at specific scales, not failures of “mind-stuff.”

Identity

Identity = intersecting continuity patterns (physical, biological, cognitive, phenomenological, narrative).

Summary

Reality is process.
Processes exhibit multiple, irreducible aspectual types depending on scale and access mode.
Consciousness, self, agency, and mathematics are real phenomena grounded in physical processes, not additional substances.
Substance-based metaphysical problems dissolve because they presuppose ontological entities that do not exist.
What remains are clear, empirically tractable questions about architecture, scale, and explanatory mapping.

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