What is real, where is value, how do you know, does it make a difference?

THis April I’m doing an interview with Jim Rutt on his Worldviews Channel. He’s going to ask me three questions. I thought I’d get a head start here.

Almost everyone immediately starts by thinking about what reality is made of. That move sends you down the wrong track. You either picture reality as built up from simpler units, or—what’s fashionable today—you treat relations (the “in-between” of the units) as what reality is made of. Either way, you end up needing to explain how levels “emerge” from each other—where “emerge” is supposed to do explanatory work, but usually functions as a placeholder for gaps in your explanatory mechanism.

This made-of approach leaves most of reality behind. There’s another way to start: ask what reality is made with. You can even map this onto Aristotle’s causes: made of isolates material cause; made with brings in efficient, formal, and final causes, plus enabling conditions. It’s immediately more inclusive—and it lets me do three things that the made-of framing struggles with:

• provide real mechanisms for complexity, value, and meaning

• give a plausible account of the unreasonable pace of novelty and creativity in the universe

• define “relations” more precisely in general, and “process-relations” more specifically

Take pizza. Pizza is made of dough; dough is made of wheat; wheat is made of molecules, and so on. But pizza is also made with the culture that developed the recipe, and the oven that cooks it—and therefore with the industrial systems that gave us ovens. The wheat is made with the agricultural revolution. These are historical processes that unfold over time, and they escape what you can point to when you ask, “So what is pizza exactly, right here?” Pizza is the end product, the put-together of historical processes, but it also is the continuation of present processes and it’s impossible to draw the boundary between the coming-into-being of the pizza and its going-out-of-being. Is the pizza in your stomach still pizza? At what point is it not pizza?

Now consider an orchestra playing a symphony, and a room full of people listening. It includes the historical processes that produced the music: a culture, a composer, training traditions, instrument-making. But the music is also made with the instruments being played, the musicians playing them, the sound waves coupling into bodies, the eardrum vibrations, the neurons translating vibration into lived experience. When we ask what reality is made with, the answer spreads across dimensions—but can’t be reduced to any one of them. What is the music ultimately made with then? It is ultimately made with all these relations that are co-varying with each other – the tempo of the music, the covariant sound waves that give rise to resonance and harmony, the co-variant responses of the neurons—everything is relational motion, and all the motion is co-varying. This is the fundamental way to describe what the music is made with– namely, co-variant motion-relations.

These three words are key to understanding what reality is: the largest symphony we can imagine. When motions begin to co-vary, patterns arise that can settle into coherent patterns, like the way music can set up patterns of anticipation and satisfaction as our affective streams co-vary with them.

I want to highlight that all relations are motion-relations; and reality is made with motion-relations that settle into coherent patterns or schemas we call “forms.”

Coherent schema can be thought of as forms when they settle into stable or meta-stable patterns. Still, to explain what reality is, we need to keep the processes in the foreground: the motion-relations that formed them, and the ongoing processes that keep them from decomposing. I’ll argue that these motion-relations are local and evaluative, and that they also depend on a global state that supplies directionality and parametrization.

I’ll also describe local-to-global dependencies as textured, layered, or laminated relations—so that what is “local” in one context functions as “global order” in another. The terms proximate and distal help make this explicit. For example, at the proximate layer, an agent might be evaluating how to grasp a twig, while at the same time, all kinds of neuronal affective-attentional-intentional processes are happening at the distal level, and these too are motion-relations negotiating a coherent state. Look more closely, and you can zoom in on a particular cell negotiating gap junction activity with it’s neighbors— it is now the proximate layer, while the distal layer can be construed to be the racoon in the garden. As Denis Noble writes in Dance to the Tune of Life: the principles of biological relativity is that there is no priviledged level of causation.

This matters because the distal fabric affords a pre-established order or potential state for creativity and novelty in the proximate activity. Layer after layer, from distal to proximate, these schema establish the scaffolding we’ll need to explain “emergent levels” – what give rise to new properties, processes and powers.

This also gives us a cleaner definition of the elusive term potential state: in this view, a potential state is a directional dependency—a structured “waiting-for” relation between distal order and proximate formation; without forgetting that there is no priviledge direction between them, i.e. there is no “one-way direction of creative advance.” For example, obviously the evolution of the sheep depended on the evolution of bacteria; but there is a bacteria that only lives in sheep bladder, and therefore depends on the sheep having evolved in the first place.

What we call “laws” were, originally, co-variant relations that were not yet settled into coherent schema—relations that, over time, became “welded together.” They become settled because the schema satisfy a valance along some gradient conditions (lower action thresholds, increasing entropy, decreasing free energy); they become welded because they seed other co-variances that seed other co-variances, until the matrix is near-impossible to dismantle, because all those layers of gradient conditions must be violated simultaneously for the whole thing to decompose.

What we call “evolution” is the history of successful establishment of material, biological, physiological, and ecological co-variant relations into relatively stable schema we call “species.”

What we call “embryogenesis” is the successful establishment of co-variant relations among cells into local-to-global-to-local schema, each associated with a distinct ontogenetic phase.

What we call “geopolitics” is an ongoing attempt to establish stable co-variant relations among groups with different identities, interests, and thresholds.

Notice that across these examples, there is a different range of motion in the co-variant relations. Notice also that, in each case, the global state—the locking in gradient that gives the motion directionality—is unique.

• In physics: quantum states, vector-tensor spaces (Minkowski, Hilbert), thermodynamic directionality, and so on.

• In evolution: fitness landscapes, basins and attractors, genetic drift

• In morphogenesis: pressure gradients, chemical gradients, bioelectric gradients.

• In geopolitics: markets, resource flows, and thick normative dimensions.

In my work we can think of these as “topological features” – and they can be modelled mathematically as topological spaces. The dynamics between the local events and the topological constraints and affordances generates the apparent emergence of discrete levels of reality. More on this to come.

Schema are patterns established as co-variant relations become stable or meta-stable. But what are co-variant relations?

A lot of process philosophers say relations are fundamental, but then they use words like “interconnected,” which often smuggles in the picture of static things connected by lines—networks, categorical relationships. In other words, they take the process out of process-relational philosophy.

For me, relations are motion-relations. Co-variance therefore refers to motions that become coordinated—co-varying in one way or another (often in more than one way at once). Co-vary may mean moving in the same direction at the same time, or at the same tempo. It may also mean opposite directions, different time signatures—what matters is that the motions remain related in a characteristic manner. Timing (or periodic coordination) is one way, structural coupling is another, mutual coordination to a global field, is a third way, and shared norms is a fourth way that motions can become co-variant.

Again, if those characteristics persist, we call them schema. If they are inviolable, we call them laws. If they remain negotiable and ongoing, we call them choices, preferences, and negotiations.

Across disciplines, I’ve identified four generator functions for co-variance: periodic (temporal), structural, field-gradient, and normative.

Structural

Structural co-variance is the easiest to picture. There are two kinds.

• Physical structural coupling: a seesaw. Two bodies co-vary through a structure. If you build a real tetrahedron, its sides and angles are structurally coupled in the material object.

• Abstract structural coupling: if you use the geometrical properties of a tetrahedron to model a system mathematically, the elements of the model are structurally coupled in an abstract sense.

Being “coupled” means: once set in motion, the motions co-vary—up/down on the seesaw; tension/push/pull in the tetrahedron; constrained behavior in the model.

Normative

Human culture—and also insect and animal behavior—co-vary through normative relations. These can be symbolic-linguistic, but they’re often instinctual, ritualistic, or habituated. They can be explicit or deeply unconscious.

Periodic (temporal)

A broad, fascinating category I can’t detail here. Easy cases are synchronized phases. Harder cases include things like cicada emergence cycles around prime-number periodicities. There are frontiers here too: coincidence-detection timing in receptors and cellular processes, molecular clocks, and speculative work around sub-cellular timing dynamics (e.g., discussions of time-crystal-like phenomena in biology).

There’s also research underway suggesting (and this is speculative on my part) that periodicity may underlie—or at least structurally organize—many “field effects.” Two concrete examples (that I retrieved from GSNV-GPT) where periodicity is treated as primitive:

1) Floquet physics + time crystals: periodicity as the starting rule
2) Thermal QFT (KMS / imaginary time): temperature becomes a periodic circle

What I’m pointing at (speculatively): in both cases, what looks like a “field” is doing its organizing work through a phase-like geometry—a variable that loops back on itself. In that sense, a field can often be modeled as a kind of periodic space.

Field-gradients

Field-gradient co-variance is distinctive because motions become co-variant not primarily through direct local coupling, but through shared alignment to a larger directional field—magnetic fields, morphogenetic gradients, background conditions.

A field of sunflowers turning to face the sun are “in sync” not because they influence each other directly, but because each is oriented by the same background field of light.

There’s overlap here with the periodic category, and here’s the key: sometimes the “clock” lives at the global level. When that happens, what looks like local periodic coordination can be re-described as field-gradient coordination: local agents entrain to the same distal phase structure, rather than directly coordinating with each other. This is what gives us the clue about fields as periodicities – just run the analogy in reverse: If the “clock” looks like a field when it is distal background, then the field might look like a clock when it is the proximate anchor.

In other words: sometimes a field is a gradient, and sometimes a field is a clock—and the difference is where you place the anchor.

A real-world example of all the generators: the lumberjacks

Think of two people using one of those huge saws to cut down a tree.

• They must co-vary temporally (push/pull in sync).

• The saw itself is a structural coupling that co-varies with their bodies.

• There’s normative co-variance (shared valuation: this work is worth it; this is permissible; this is the job; etc.).

• And there are field effects (markets, migration, westward expansion, institutional forces) that shape why they’re there at all. They didn’t jointly plan the whole historical situation; they’re each responding to larger gradients that lower thresholds in some directions and raise them in others.

I’ve described these four functors (generator functions) in human terms, but I’m claiming they apply all the way down to the quantum level and up to the cosmological—and all the way around. That’s how I avoid the usual headache of “how do quantum events become human events?” The functors are invariant across transformations across scale and complexity.

A brief physical analogy: a quartz clock. Quartz oscillates with stable periodicity when energized. But it isn’t a clock until we establish co-variant relations with it—hands on a dial, a digital display—and even then we need normative co-variance about what “12 hours” means, anchored in structural co-variance with the rotation of the earth. And beneath that, the stability of oscillation rests in field conditions—what kinds of schema are possible at all.

Similarly, in morphogenesis, cells negotiate position, location, and role through contact, morphogen gradients, and bioelectric gradients. Fields create schema not because individuals are directly co-varying, but because individuals are navigating the same gradients.

[As an aside]

This brings us to my definitions of “information” and “knowledge.”
Any system whose members share co-variant relations has information. This is somewhat tautological since that is what a system is –

In order to extract information from that system, the knower must enter into adequate co-variant relations with it—either directly through observation/direct perception or mediated by an instrument, and/or data, and/or theory/models. Notice this directly addresses the measurement problem – you can’t have knowledge of the system “out there” you can only have knowledge of the new system that includes your role as a co-varying member.

Lastly on this note, I define math as the precise description of the universe’s co-variant relations. Math consists of equations like V=IR, e=mc^2, – where something on one side of the equals mark is equivalent to something on the other side. The first describes how voltage, impedance and resistance co-vary, the second describes how energy covaries with mass and speed, in terms of the third Schrodinger equation, GSNV-GPT says: The equation expresses a co-variance between global evaluative constraints (the Hamiltonian), structured possibility (the wavefunction), and stabilized values (energy), such that only those forms of possibility that are mutually attuned to the system’s dynamics become real.

Is math real?

Draw a Venn diagram. One circle is the set of all mathematics that people have explored. The second circle is the set of all mathematics that nature has exploited. There is the intersection, but each has its own lune. Now consider the set of mathematics that people have not yet explored. Is there a set of mathematics that nature has not yet exploited? I would say yes. Because as new co-variant relations are established, new ways to exploit those relations arise, and they often need to be described by new maths, like the math of deep non-periodic tiling in crystals (ex: The Second Kind of Impossible).

[OK. Let’s continue]

Co-variant relations become stable or meta-stable patterns through evaluative processes.

Back to the lumberjacks: when they start, they’re clumsy. They improve through practice. But what “guides” improvement isn’t a set of instructions—it’s an evaluative feedback loop in the body. If they overthink it, it often gets worse. The best pair of lumberjacks works as if they have one body.

Same with great musicians, except their bodies merge with the instruments and with the other muscians. Think of Yo-Yo Ma, or Coltrane: an exquisite co-variant schema between body and instrument, refined through a loop of evaluation—movement toward satisfaction. And once a new level is reached, what satisfied yesterday doesn’t satisfy today. The search for novelty continues. Together with other musicians in the band, they share normative and affective feedback-loops that continualy alter and refine their playing-together. In all these ways, the universe grows.

Now bring that back to morphogenesis: cells navigating contact, chemical, and bioelectric gradients require feedback and evaluation. It doesn’t work without an evaluative loop. And further down, when atoms and particles “navigate” quantum fields, you may not want to use the word “evaluative”—but I do. It’s the best word we have for threshold-sensitive, direction-conditioned selection among possible action-paths.

Which brings us to value and meaning.

The evaluative process is triggered by an excitation that crosses a certain boundary condition or breaches a certain threshold so that the proximate arena shifts its configuration from a resting (relatively stable) state to an arousal state. Note that this “threatens” the stability of the schema and sets the entire “matrix of relations” in motion. The configuration can be a certain cocktail of neuro-affective chemicals in an animal body, or it can be a meteorological confluence of pressure and temperature gradients, or it can be an electron that is hit by a photon and triggers a new EM waveform. Physicists already say that these dynamics must “satisfy the laws” or “satisfy the equations” – and I want to take that term literally, since the animal’s arousal state must be satisfied, too. So here we have the basic formula for evaluative processes:

arousal state >>>> actions that satisfy

Consider an electron receiving a packet of energy from an electromagnetic field. It enters an arousal state that must be “satisfied.” Physicists even say explanations must “satisfy” the laws of physics—our language already carries the trace.

In that case, the electron might jump to a higher orbit or emit a photon. Which path occurs depends on the larger global context—the quantum field. The global state conditions the feedback loop; it parametrizes the evaluation: “jump or emit?”

Why did arousal happen at all? Here I define arousal as excitation (excess energy, free energy) that occurs when a threshold is breached. The global state is continuous, but thresholds trigger discrete local events. That gives you a way to explain why reality looks discretized while preserving the continuity that must be there.

This maps directly to cognitive science. Continuous allostatic regulation runs in the background. Within a range, there’s little dramatic change. Once a threshold is crossed, a subsystem enters arousal and seeks satisfaction through feedback loops—often without awareness. Say, my blood sugar levels drop, and the pancreas is aroused into action. If that fails, another threshold is crossed and “Bonnie” starts craving chocolate. If Bonnie is a child and can’t regulate, the family can enter a collective arousal state. Scale it up far enough and you get an empire reorganizing supply chains—satisfied, perhaps, by colonial sugar plantations. And so the universe grows.

Global arousal states in the brain are classified by EEG frequency: delta, theta, beta and alpha—they are generated by periodic co-variant motion-relations in the brain and thus function as the evaluative manifold against which brain processing happens.

The point: arousal seeking satisfaction is inherently evaluative. But evaluation can’t happen in a vacuum. It depends on gradients that give evaluation directionality—its meaning. Consider, for example, that the following are meaningless:

• Thermostat in a world with no temperature differences

• Compass on a planet with no magnetic field

And each loop from arousal to satisfaction contributes to shaping the global evaluative field, contributing to the on-going practices of meaning-making all woven throughout all depths and reach across the universe.

Mindedness As the Driver of Creative Advance

I define mind as mindedness: what happens between arousal and action. It describes how an organism, agent, entity, even an electron, can and cannot seek out satisfaction—what action paths are available, how they’re evaluated, what thresholds are in play. Mindedness is proximately local, but depends upon a distal order—a global state that makes particular trajectories reachable.

So mindedness is one of the ways the universe grows from pre-established order into novel order—through the negotiation of successful co-variant relations. Sometimes the schema are ready-made; sometimes entirely new schema are needed. Andreas Wagner’s Sleeping Beauties helps here: when organisms adopt new schema, they don’t just add a tiny unit of capacity—they adopt entire schemas; they often acquire an entire bundle of affordances that exceeds the original need—like buying a whole box of crayons to get “green,” and suddenly having new capacities “for free.” That’s one way to make sense of why the universe seems supersaturated with novelty and value.

Let’s retrace and then step forward. There’s no evidence for emergence as an explanation—people use it because they need something to bridge the gap. The real issue isn’t evidence; it’s explanatory power.

As soon as a bench scientist completes an experiment and turns toward interpretation, they’re no longer just a bench scientist. They’re a theoretician, a meta-theoretical scientist—or yes, a metaphysician. Interpretations must not conflict with evidence, but they are not strictly bounded by it. That’s why disagreements persist for decades.

The scientist produces evidence; interpretation has its own standards, including:

• greater explanatory power

• advancing the field by expanding hypothesis formulation and opening new experiments

You can do useful calculations treating gravity as a force—until the interpretation fails and evidence pushes you into a new frame.

So: what are the standards? I use five:

• Clarity: precise definitions, clean language, sharp reasoning
  Words like “emergence” in scientific religion and “relations” in process-relational philosophy are often allowed to slide. I’ve tried to lock terms down by triangulating them from multiple perspectives.

• Simplexity: captures essence without reduction; releases complexity without deleting it
  Think geo-centric vs helio-centric astronomy: both can predict, but one requires epicycles upon epicycles. A small shift unlocks major explanatory power. That’s what I’m aiming for: closing gaps and opening science.

• Error correction: self-repair across domains; checks contradictions
  Errors corrected here include: relying on made-of explanations while ignoring made-with; using “emergence” as mysterium; trying to derive higher-order properties and powers that were never initialized.

• Unity/scope: says more with less; integrates without flattening
  Co-variance does heavy lifting: it specifies what relations are (as process-relations), yields functors that invite empirical research, avoids placeholder explanations, scales from quantum to culture, and generates testable hypotheses about the global-state mechanisms that co-variant schema depend upon.

• Pragmatic: returns to lived experience
  This isn’t only abstract. Lumberjacks, symphonies, learning, craft, coordination. And pragmatism also means it can be tested—phenomenologically, hermeneutically, and scientifically.

Since I consider myself a metaphysician, this is how I work things out. It gives me explanatory integrations in science and philosophy that I don’t see elsewhere. It changes how I teach: it helps people stop code-switching between philosophical and scientific vocabularies; it helps them avoid new-age fantasies and pseudo-scientific fallacies; it helps integrate human value and cognition with science.

But it doesn’t really change how I live my life—because that would be running the movie backwards. My metaphysics is an attempt to make explicit what I’ve learned through living and experimenting: gardening, training horses, building companies, deep phenomenology, collective practices, and so on.

Further down the line, I also apply this to human normative systems—for example by distinguishing justice, ethics, and morality. People in tech-governance have found that clarifying, especially when conversations collapse into people talking past each other.

And right now I’m building two cognitive service agents based on these design principles: an evaluative AI that directly imports the features of this metaphysics which I call GSNV – Global State Naturalized View.