Relational Holon Theory vs Symbiotic Existential Cosmology
Two Visions of Reality, One Irreducible Triad
Author: Sungchul Ji, Ph.D.
With assistance from ChatGPT-4o
Date: June 27, 2025
Introduction
Two emerging cosmological frameworks—John Kineman’s Relational Holon Theory and Chris King’s Symbiotic Existential Cosmology (SEC)—offer bold attempts to reformulate our understanding of reality, consciousness, and causality. While they originate from different disciplines and philosophical orientations, they converge on a deeper insight: reality is not reducible to classical physicalism.
This post shows how these two frameworks can be interpreted as tokens of a deeper type—what I call the Phenomenology–Semiotics–Geometry (PSG) triad—and how this triadic foundation helps unify scientific explanation with subjective experience.
1. Kineman’s Main Claim: Reintegrating the Four Causes
John Kineman argues that classical science operates under an incomplete causal paradigm, which he calls the "2½ causes model":
Material cause (states)
Efficient cause (forces)
½ formal cause, reduced to uncertainty
Final cause excluded altogether
Kineman proposes a return to Aristotle’s full causal schema—especially restoring formal and final causes to scientific legitimacy. Drawing on Robert Rosen’s (M,R)-systems and category theory, he claims that living systems anticipate—they model themselves and their environments—and in doing so, they close the causal loop.
This loop allows for identity, self-reference, and agency, grounding consciousness within science, not as an external metaphysical postulate.
This relational framework constitutes what Kineman calls a holon—a whole that is also part of a larger whole—and gives rise to a modeling identity that anticipates, interprets, and acts with purpose.
2. SEC’s Main Claim: Subjectivity as the Primal Axiom
Chris King, author of Symbiotic Existential Cosmology (SEC), begins from a different starting point: subjective consciousness is not only real—it is primary. He postulates what he calls the primal axiom of subjectivity, which states:
Subjective consciousness has volitional efficacy over the physical universe.
SEC frames reality as a symbiotic unfolding of subjectivity and physicality:
Conscious experience evolves in tandem with the cosmos.
Biological life is not an accidental byproduct, but a necessary emergence.
Volition is real and effective—shaping reality as much as it is shaped by it.
SEC thus offers a phenomenological cosmology rooted in symbiosis, evolution, and agency. It aligns closely with traditions like panpsychism, integral biology, and experiential cosmology.
3. Side-by-Side Comparison: Kineman vs. SEC
4. PSG (Phenomenology-Semiotics-Geometry): A Triadic Type [1] Unifying Both Theories
Despite their different starting points, Kineman and SEC can be viewed as tokens of a common triadic type:
Together, these theories show that reality is not dyadic but triadic—requiring subject (experience), object (structure), and relation (semiosis). This is the same insight underlying the Irreducible Triadic Relation (ITR) found in Peirce, biology, and consciousness studies.
5. Conclusion: Toward a Triadic Cosmology
Both Kineman and SEC represent emergent cosmologies seeking to transcend the 20th-century materialist paradigm. Each addresses, in its own way, the unfinished business of modern science: how to account for meaning, consciousness, and purpose.
SEC provides the phenomenological root: that consciousness is real, volitional, and central.
Kineman provides the formal scaffold: a structure in which that consciousness can be causally and mathematically grounded.
Seen together, they form a consilient pair—united by a third element: the triadic geometry of explanation. This triadic unity—Phenomenology, Semiotics, and Geometry—may provide the scaffold for a new science of reality.
References:
[1] Ji, S. (2025). Seoulator and the Geometry of Reality: A Consilience on ITR (Irreducible Triadic Relation). https://622622.substack.com/p/seoulator-and-the-geometry-of-reality.
[2] Ji, S. (2018). The Universality of the Irreducible Triadic Relation. In: The Cell Language Theory: Connecting Mind and Matter. World Scientific Publishing, New Jersey. Pp. 377-393.
Acknowledgments
This post is part of an ongoing exploration of the Irreducible Triadic Relation (ITR) and the Geometry of Reality (GOR). With gratitude to Chris King, John Kineman, Charles Peirce, and Robert Rosen