FAQ
Questions people naturally ask
These answers are derived from the project’s canonical FAQ and kept consistent with the Rev 5 master text.
Is this panpsychism?
No. The ontology does not claim that everything is aware. Awareness arises only when information is registered from a perspective. Many informational systems lack awareness entirely.
Is this just information theory or computationalism?
No. Information is defined ontologically as structured difference, not as signal, encoding, or computation. Computational and informational theories may model instances of this structure, but they do not ground it.
Does this explain consciousness?
The ontology specifies the structural conditions under which awareness can arise. It does not offer a psychological, neuroscientific, or phenomenological theory of consciousness.
Is meaning dependent on language?
No. Meaning arises from structured value within awareness. Language is one way meaning can be expressed or stabilized, but it is not its source.
Is value subjective here?
Value is system-relative but not arbitrary. It arises from structural constraints within a system, not from opinion or preference in the everyday sense.
Does this imply free will or moral responsibility?
No such claims are made in the core ontology. Questions of free will, ethics, and responsibility are downstream applications that depend on additional assumptions.
Is this an AI alignment framework?
No. While the ontology can be applied to artificial systems, it does not propose designs, objectives, or alignment strategies.
Why isn’t this fully formalized mathematically?
Because awareness, value, meaning, and purpose are structurally definable but not exhaustively formalizable without loss. The ontology explicitly addresses the limits of formalization.