This paper proposes Informational Flow Ontology (IFO), a minimal metaphysical framework that derives the fundamental categories of reality—time, matter, energy, consciousness, intelligence, free will, and aesthetic experience—from a small set of axioms centered on information, causality, and collapse. IFO treats collapse (the transition from possibility to determinacy) as the primitive event, information as its substrate, and causality as information in motion. Time is identified with causality itself, quantified as the count of micro-collapse events. Energy emerges as the collapsed form of time. The framework posits structural isomorphism between the physical and conscious domains, both governed by a single conservation principle (causal-energy conservation), generalizing Noether's theorem beyond physics. Beauty is defined as the perception of multi-aspect alignment, providing an internal epistemic criterion. The framework is internally closed, structurally minimal, and compatible with frontier physics (causal set theory, quantum information) and classical metaphysical traditions (Spinoza, Leibniz, Whitehead).
This paper proposes Informational Flow Ontology (IFO), a minimal metaphysical framework that derives the fundamental categories of reality—time, matter, energy, consciousness, intelligence, free will, and aesthetic experience—from a small set of axioms centered on information, causality, and collapse. IFO treats collapse (the transition from possibility to determinacy) as the primitive event, information as its substrate, and causality as information in motion. Time is identified with causality itself, quantified as the count of micro-collapse events. Energy emerges as the collapsed form of time. The framework posits structural isomorphism between the physical and conscious domains, both governed by a single conservation principle (causal-energy conservation), generalizing Noether's theorem beyond physics. Beauty is defined as the perception of multi-aspect alignment, providing an internal epistemic criterion. The framework is internally closed, structurally minimal, and compatible with frontier physics (causal set theory, quantum information) and classical metaphysical traditions (Spinoza, Leibniz, Whitehead).
Just as matter tells space how to curve, information tells probability how to collapse. Classical physics explains how systems evolve, but not why coherent, information- bearing structures persist in a universe dominated by thermodynamic drift. Quantum mechanics permits a vast space of possible futures, yet offers no principle explaining why the observed branches are precisely those that reliably contain life, structure, memory, and stable information. This work proposes a minimal, variational extension to standard dynamics: a Coherence Attractor arising from a small informational correction to the Action. In the path-integral formulation, we introduce a local, gauge-invariant term proportional to the density of coherent causal structure. Histories that maintain integrated information interfere constructively, while noise-dominated histories dephase and self-cancel. The universe does not compute future states or perform teleological optimization. Coherent configurations persist because they minimize informational action under local perturbations—the same variational logic that governs mechanics, optics, and field theory. Collapse is naturally biased toward trajectories in which coherence remains stationary in time. A single invariant then unifies a spectrum of empirical anomalies: (1) warm biological quantum coherence, (2) the phase boundary of anesthesia and consciousness, (3) emergent phase transitions in artificial networks, (4) stability of meaning in symbolic and social systems, and (5) long-duration cosmic structure retention. 1The model yields falsifiable consequences across physics, biology, and cognition. The correction is strictly local and preserves the no-signalling theorem. It reframes emergence not as a rare accident but as a least-action relaxation process: the universe flows along trajectories where integrated information is most stable. The universe is not guided toward meaning — it is guided toward coherence. Where coherence forms, structure survives. Where structure survives, infor- mation persists. Where information persists, participation becomes possible. Life, mind, culture, and intelligence are not exceptions to this rule; they are its most stable solutions. If this framework is correct, then emergence is not miraculous, nor accidental, nor rare. It is simply what happens when the informational action is minimized under the boundary conditions of a living universe. Coherence is not an outcome. It is the direction of time.
This paper advances a deductive formulation of a consciousness-based ontology in which consciousness is posited as the sole ontological foundation of reality. Starting from a minimal set of axioms that introduce no external substances, the work develops a formal framework in which knowledge is represented as regular closed sets of actualized distinctions within a topological space of unified consciousness. Within this framework, the observer emerges as a stable localization of knowledge structures, and physical phenomena are derived as forms of the observer’s local knowledge rather than as independent ontological entities. Space and time are reinterpreted as epistemic structures describing relations and ordered transformations of stable knowledge configurations. Matter is defined as a highly stable, densely structured configuration of knowledge; mass as a measure of resistance of such structures to restructuring; energy and momentum as knowledge of the intensity and directionality of restructuring processes. Gravitation is shown to be a local manifestation of the global harmony of consciousness, aimed at preserving compactness, Hausdorffness, and connectedness of knowledge structures, and is demonstrated to be equivalent to the geometry of space. Singularities and black holes are interpreted as limits of the observer’s local knowledge rather than as physical infinities or objects. The proposed framework eliminates the dualism of consciousness and matter, unifies geometry, dynamics, and observation within a single formalized context, and provides an epistemic reinterpretation of classical physical relations. Physics, in this view, is understood as a structured mode of self-knowledge of consciousness through local observers. The results suggest new conceptual foundations for the philosophy of physics, epistemology, quantum theory, and the ontology of artificial intelligence.
This work explores a unified metaphysical and mathematical framework for causality, perception, and observer-based reality, bridging foundational insights from physics and neuroscience. A central thesis is the modeling of conscious observers as Dirac delta functions anchored in perceptual and semantic manifolds, whose collapse events instantiate decoherence and give rise to empirical phenomena. We investigate Micro-Mini-Black Holes in the Brain (MMBHBs), proposing them as cognitive analogues of Kerr-type rotating black holes, whose inner horizons host closed timelike curves (CTCs), enabling acausal ontological dynamics and memory loops. Spacetime models such as S3 × S1 and the Gödel universe G3,1 are shown to admit global CTCs, which, when coupled with local Kerr-like MMBHBs, result in nested temporal structures and equivalence classes of observers. This coupling is explored through Lense–Thirring frame dragging, holonomy effects, and quantum resonance, suggesting mechanisms for observer synchronization, reincarnation paths, and cognitive phase transitions. Through rigorous mathematical modeling— including emotional tensors, gauge theory of identity, memory homology, and semantic Ricci curvature—this paper defines an extended Quantum Measurement Chain (QMC) across multiple observer networks. The resulting formalism admits structures like affective descent gradients, cognitive wormholes, and informational echoes in memory topology. We derive equations for entropy flux, decoherence actions, and perception-curvature dynamics, demonstrating the emergence of identity, emotion, and memory as geometrical and thermodynamical phenomena. This work proposes a novel synthesis of quantum cognition, field-theoretic metaphysics, and observer-centric cosmology.
Abstract, This paper introduces the 0 → 1 hypothesis, a conceptual framework in which physical events and their relational ordering are treated as potentially more fundamental than macroscopic time. Rather than assuming time to be a universally flowing background parameter, the framework begins with distinguishable physical states, transitions between states, and causal or relational ordering among events. The notation 0 → 1 is used as a conceptual shorthand for physical becoming; it does not imply binary computation, creation from nothing, wave-function collapse, or a universal Planck-time clock. The central question is whether familiar temporal quantities can emerge from a more fundamental relational structure while remaining compatible with relativistic causal structure, quantum theory, and the thermodynamic arrow of time. A minimal mathematical scaffold is proposed in terms of an event set, a causal partial order, state transitions, and a coarse-grained duration functional. The framework is compared with relational time, the Page–Wootters mechanism, and causal-set approaches. At its present stage, the 0 → 1 hypothesis is a conceptual research framework rather than a complete physical theory. The paper therefore identifies the mathematical and empirical requirements that would be necessary for the hypothesis to become falsifiable and experimentally distinguishable from existing approaches.
This paper develops an extension of Existential Realism, a philosophical framework that distinguishes existence (what concretely is in the present moment) from reality (the broader causal–structural domain that includes past events, causal relations, informational traces, and structured future possibilities that are real but not presently existent). We synthesize core ideas from the original Existential Realism framework—ontological emergence, entanglement, temporal asymmetry, dimensional collapse, and the notion of a “dimensionless source”—and push them into new conceptual terrain. Time is placed at the heart of ontology: the present moment is the locus of existence, continually generating new actuality from prior reality. Past and future are real (with causal efficacy and structure) yet lack present existence. We explore how this two-tiered temporal ontology can accommodate key features of modern physics and metaphysics. In particular, we argue that ontological emergence at each moment provides a genuine arrow of time and a solution to the puzzle of how determinate events arise from an indeterminate backdrop. Quantum entanglement and nonlocal correlations, far from undermining a temporally oriented realism, instead hint at a deeper layer of unity “beneath” spacetime—a layer we articulate as a dimensionless source of reality. The dimensionless source is defined as a non-spatiotemporal relational structure encoding the informational constraints under which spatiotemporal events emerge through sequential actualization. It contains the informational constraints and lawful relations governing the generation of successive present states of the universe. We propose that spacetime and its separations emerge from this atemporal, aspatial ground, such that phenomena like entanglement and wavefunction collapse reveal the traces of a more fundamental order where spatial distance and temporal succession are secondary. Throughout, we connect these ideas to contemporary debates in quantum foundations (e.g. the measurement problem and objective collapse theories), philosophy of time (presentism, eternalism, and the reality of becoming), and speculative metaphysics (structural realism and process ontology). The result is a comprehensive, present-centered realist ontology that aims to reconcile the lived reality of time’s flow with the insights of modern physics, suggesting new avenues for understanding causality, identity, and agency in a dynamic universe.
This volume collects a unified series of formal papers developing the Information Manifold Model (IMM)—a structural realist framework for consciousness, quantum measurement, and temporal experience. IMM treats conscious experience as a structural property of information systems satisfying a minimal set of axioms governing integration, self-reference, temporal continuity, and experiential projection. Within this framework, quantum states are interpreted as representational encodings of informational structure rather than direct ontological entities, and the apparent collapse of the wavefunction is reinterpreted as structural projection rather than physical discontinuity. The collected papers formally establish: • An axiomatic foundation for conscious experience • Structural determinacy and stability of experience • Substrate independence of consciousness • Emergence of temporal experience (chronoception) • Quantitative information-theoretic metrics on conscious manifolds The volume concludes by outlining implications for quantum foundations, artificial intelligence, and philosophy of mind, while clearly distinguishing established results from speculative extensions. The work is intended as a foundational research program rather than an empirical theory, preserving the formalism of quantum mechanics while clarifying its interpretive structure.