Metaphysics
The Absolute Metaphysical System
Complete Q&A Edition — 25 Sections · 100 Answers
Existence exists. Identity is absolute. Everything else follows.
This is the canonical statement of the system — secular, axiomatic, and absolute.
Read it straight through, or return to it as a permanent reference.
I. THE AXIOMS OF REALITY (Q1–Q4)
1. Why is there something rather than nothing?
Because existence is the starting point of all facts and all explanations. “Nothing” is not a thing—it has no properties, no identity, no causal power, and no capacity to “be.” To ask “why is there something?” presupposes that non-existence was ever a real alternative; it was not. Existence is eternal, uncreated, and self-sufficient. The question dissolves once the stolen concept is exposed.
2. What does it mean to exist?
To exist is to possess identity—to be something, in some definite way, independent of any observer. Existence without identity is impossible, because nothing can exist without the characteristics that make it what it is. Identity is not an extra property of existence; it is what existence is. Existence is everything that has identity; identity is the nature of everything that exists.
3. What kinds of things exist?
Only concrete particulars—entities with determinate spatio-temporal and causal identity—exist. Abstract objects, “possibilities,” universals, and fictional constructs do not have being. All that exists are actual entities and their attributes, actions, and relations. There is no realm beyond the actual; the actual is the full scope of being.
4. Is reality one substance or many?
Reality is plural. There is no single metaphysical “One,” no underlying monistic substrate, no primordial unifying essence. The world consists of many independent entities, each with its own specific identity. The unity of reality is epistemological (a unified field of knowledge), not ontological (a single substance). Monism collapses into contradiction because identity requires multiplicity.
II. IDENTITY & NON-CONTRADICTION (Q5–Q7)
5. Do merely possible entities exist?
No. Possibility is not a mode of being; it is an epistemic category describing what actual entities could do given their identities. Nothing exists that is not actual. Treating “possibles” as entities reifies abstractions and violates the primacy of existence. Only the actual has ontological standing.
6. Are relations internal or external?
Relations are external—they arise from the interaction and comparison of independently existing entities. No relation exists “inside” an entity as an intrinsic metaphysical link. The identity of each relatum is independent of the relation; the relation is derivative of the entities involved. This preserves individuation and prevents metaphysical holism.
7. What is composition? Under what conditions do parts form a whole?
Composition is the structural identity of an integrated set of parts. When components are arranged in a functional, organized manner, they are the whole—no extra “glue,” form, or metaphysical binder is required. Wholes exist when the arrangement has causal-operational unity. The identity of the whole is fully determined by the identities and organization of its parts.
III. INDIVIDUATION & HAECCEITY (Q8–Q11)
8. Do propositions or states of affairs exist?
No. These are conceptual tools—linguistic and epistemological—not metaphysical entities. A proposition does not “exist” beyond the minds using it. What exists are entities, their actions, and their causal relations; propositions describe them but add no new beings to the ontology.
9. What makes an entity the same over time?
An entity persists through continuous structural and causal continuity grounded in its primitive thisness (haecceity). Haecceity is not a tunable property but the brute fact of this particular existing. Continuity explains how that thisness is maintained; haecceity explains what is maintained. Identity-through-time is secured by the sustained organization and activity that retains the entity’s nature. Change occurs; continuity remains unbroken.
10. How do entities begin and cease to exist?
An entity begins when a new structural organization emerges that possesses its own causal identity. It ceases when that organization disintegrates and loses the capacity for unified action. Coming-to-be and passing away are transformations of structure, not movements from non-being to being. Existence as such never begins or ends—entities do.
11. What grounds individuality and numerical distinctness?
Primitive thisness (haecceity) is the metaphysical ground of individuality. Two entities may share numerous properties but cannot share their identity-as-this. Numerical distinctness is not a property but a fact of existence: each entity is irreducibly itself. This secures individuation without invoking universals or abstract identity conditions.
IV. SPACE (Q12–Q14)
12. What is time?
Time is the measurement of motion and change among entities. It is not a thing, a container, or a separate substance. Time is relational and depends on entities acting; without change, time would have no content or meaning.
13. Does time have a beginning?
No. A beginning would require a prior absence of action, which is impossible. Since existence is eternal and entities always act according to identity, the measurable aspect of that action—time—is likewise beginningless. The Big Bang is a transformation within an already-existing reality, not the origin of time.
14. What is space?
Space is the relational framework generated by coexisting entities. It is not an independent substance; it is the set of spatial relations among actual particulars. Space has no identity apart from the entities whose relations it measures. Like time, it is relational, not ontologically prior.
V. TIME (Q15–Q18)
15. Are space and time continuous or discrete?
Continuity is metaphysical: any spatial or temporal interval is divisible without inherent limit. Discreteness may appear in empirical physics, but that is a contingent scientific question, not a metaphysical one. Metaphysics cannot presuppose indivisible “granules” of space or time; the continuum is the base condition.
16. What is the cosmos?
The cosmos is the totality of all interacting entities—no more and no less. It is not a super-entity, a god-like whole, or a unified substance. It is the complete system formed by all actual particulars and their causal relations. “The universe” names this collection; it does not reify it.
17. What existed before the Big Bang?
A prior physical configuration. The Big Bang marks a phase change in the organization of matter and energy, not the creation of existence ex nihilo. There was never absolute nothing; reality always existed in some form.
18. Is the universe necessary or contingent?
Its specific form is contingent—different configurations could have obtained under different physical conditions. But existence as such is axiomatic and cannot be otherwise. The universe’s particular structure is empirical; the fact that something exists is metaphysical. Necessity applies to existence itself, not to its arrangements.
VI. CAUSATION (Q19–Q22)
19. What is causation?
Causation is the action of an entity in accordance with its identity. Nothing acts apart from what it is; every causal event is the expression of an entity’s nature. Causation is not an external imposition but the internal necessity of identity in motion. To understand a cause is to understand the relevant identity.
20. Is a first cause required?
No. The notion of a required “first cause” presupposes a prior state of non-action, which is impossible. The causal matrix is beginningless because existence is beginningless; causal action is as eternal as being. An infinite regress is not a metaphysical problem here because there is no metaphysical gap to be filled—a beginningless network of acting entities constitutes reality.
21. What is the metaphysical status of natural laws?
Natural laws are descriptions of the consistent actions of entities with specific identities; they are not independent, governing entities. Laws state what must happen given what things are, but they do not add an extra ontological realm. Laws summarize identity in action; they are epistemological generalizations, not Platonic governors.
22. Is probability fundamental?
No. Probability is an epistemic measure of uncertainty, not an ontological feature of being. At the metaphysical level events are actual and identity-bound. Uncertainty reflects limitations of knowledge, complexity, or ignorance—not metaphysical indeterminacy. Reality is fully actual.
VII. MODALITY (Q23–Q25)
23. Do possible worlds exist?
No. Possible worlds are logical and heuristic constructs for reasoning about modality; they are not actual entities. To treat them as existing multiplies worlds without necessity and violates the primacy of the actual. Modality must be grounded in the actual, not in fictional alternatives.
24. What determines metaphysical possibility?
Possibility is determined by compatibility with the identity of actual entities. Nothing is metaphysically possible that would contradict the nature of what exists. Modal claims report the range of actions permitted by identity—modal truth is a fact about causal powers, not about hypothetical realms.
25. Is modality reducible to dispositions and counterfactuals?
Yes. Dispositions are grounded in identity; counterfactuals describe what an entity would do under different conditions based on that identity. There is no separate layer of modal being. All modal truths reduce to actual causal capacities. Modality is entirely immanent.
VIII. CONSCIOUSNESS (Q26–Q28)
26. What is consciousness?
Consciousness is a biological faculty enabling an organism to perceive and respond to the world. It is an attribute of certain organized physical systems—specifically, living brains. Consciousness is a mode of functioning, not a separate substance. Its nature is fully grounded in the identity and organization of the organism.
27. How do qualia arise?
Qualia are the qualitative dimensions of awareness produced by brain–world interaction. They are not independent entities but the mode in which consciousness grasps identity. Qualia arise from physical processes that enable perception and integrate sensory information. Their reality is relational, not metaphysical.
28. What is the self?
The self is the living human organism—the brain and body functioning as an integrated unity. There is no immaterial soul or disembodied subject. Personal identity is the unity of biological structure, psychological continuity, and haecceity. The self is physical, emergent, and fully real.
IX. AGENCY & FREE WILL (Q29–Q31)
29. Can consciousness exist without a brain?
No. Consciousness is an attribute of particular neural organisms and cannot persist independent of the processes that constitute it. Hypotheses of disembodied awareness detach perception from its biological basis and are incoherent. All conscious awareness is brain-based.
30. What is intentionality?
Intentionality is the directedness of mental states toward objects or facts. It is produced by representational structures formed by neural processes that track and respond to the environment. Intentionality is not mysterious “aboutness” detached from reality; it is a functional mapping between organism and world. It is biological, not supernatural.
31. Is free will real?
Yes. Free will consists in the agent’s volitional control—especially the capacity to direct attention, deliberate, form concepts, and initiate action in accordance with one’s identity. This capacity is grounded in the brain’s complex organization: agent-level structures can generate self-initiated, goal-directed acts that are not mere epiphenomenal outcomes of microstates. Free will does not violate causality; it is an agent-causal capacity enacted by organized, living systems and introduces genuine openness at the macroscopic level.
(Note: this formulation locates free will in the agent’s causal powers—a form of agent causation compatible with physical realized identity, while denying any supernatural exception to causality.)
X. UNIVERSALS (Q32–Q34)
32. Do universals exist?
No. Universals are conceptual abstractions formed by a mind grouping similar particulars. Only particulars exist; the universal exists only as a mental tool. To reify universals is to detach meaning from identity and replace concretes with floating essences. Similarity is conceptual, not metaphysical.
33. What are properties?
Properties are modes of an entity’s identity—its structural and dispositional features. A property is not a freestanding universal but the way a particular exists and acts. Properties are real but inseparable from the entities that possess them. There are no free-floating qualitative items.
34. How do particulars “instantiate” properties?
They do not instantiate anything external to themselves; they are their properties. “Instantiation” is a conceptual account of classification. Metaphysically there is no separation between an entity and its nature. An object’s attributes are the modes of its identity.
XI. SUBSTANCE & ESSENCE (Q35–Q37)
35. What is substance?
A substance is an independently existing entity—something that does not ontologically depend on being a state, property, or relation of something else. Substances are the primary units of reality. Everything non-substantial (relations, processes, attributes) depends on substances. Entities first; all else second.
36. Do essences exist?
Yes—but not as Platonic universals. Essence is the conceptual identification of a concrete particular’s fundamental identity: the set of basic characteristics that make it the kind of thing it is. Essence is not a separate metaphysical item; it is the mind’s grasp of an entity’s causal identity. Essence is grounded in actuality, not in a separate realm.
37. Are forms or structures fundamental?
Yes. Structure is identity organized. The form of an entity is the real configuration that makes its powers, functions, and properties possible. Structures are not abstractions: they are actual organizations of matter and activity. Metaphysically, structure is as real as substance.
XII. GROUNDING (Q38–Q40)
38. What grounds what?
Higher-level phenomena depend on lower-level physical reality. Life depends on chemistry; consciousness depends on life; values depend on organisms; society depends on individuals. Grounding is one-directional and asymmetric. There is no reverse grounding where abstractions determine concretes.
39. Is there an ultimate ground of reality?
Yes: existence itself—which is groundless. Existence has no external cause, explanation, or justification. Asking “Why does existence exist?” presupposes a prior state outside existence and is therefore incoherent. Existence is the final metaphysical fact.
40. How do the levels of reality relate?
Via asymmetric dependence:
Physics → Chemistry → Life → Mind → Value → Society
Each level emerges from the previous but is not reducible to mere description of the lower. Dependence is hierarchical, not circular.
XIII. EMERGENCE (Q41–Q42)
41. Are higher-level phenomena emergent or reducible?
Both. They are causally reducible to lower-level identity yet ontologically real as organized wholes. Emergence occurs when organization creates new causal powers without adding new substances. Life emerges from chemistry; consciousness emerges from life; emergence is real and causally efficacious.
42. Does downward causation exist?
Yes. Not as magic, but as the organized whole constraining the behavior of its parts through its structure. A heart cell behaves differently inside a functioning heart than in isolation. This is not overdetermination but the causal power of organization, fully mediated by the physical identities of parts and whole.
XIV. MATHEMATICS (Q43–Q45)
43. What is the ontological status of mathematical objects?
Mathematical objects do not exist as independent beings. They are abstractions of patterns and relations found in reality. Numbers, sets, functions, and geometries exist conceptually; they are tools for modeling structure, not separate metaphysical realms.
44. Is the universe fundamentally mathematical?
No. Mathematics is derived from reality, not the reverse. Physics uses mathematics as an instrument; the world is structured matter and causal relations, not Platonic equations. Mathematical success reflects structure, not ontological priority.
45. Are values metaphysically real?
Yes. Value is an objective relation between a living organism, the facts of reality, and the requirements of its survival and flourishing. Without life there is no value; without identity there is no evaluation. Value is as metaphysical as life itself.
XV. GOD & TRANSCENDENCE (Q46–Q47)
46. Does a necessary being exist?
No. There is no personal creator, no transcendent being outside time and causation. Existence is not created; it is eternal. The concept of a necessary being as an immaterial, unconstrained consciousness is contradictory in terms of identity and causal contact.
47. Can ultimate reality transcend time and causation?
No. To exist is to act; to act is to be temporal; to be temporal is to be within causality. Timelessness equals changelessness, which equals non-existence. Nothing real exists outside identity, temporality, or causation.
XVI. NOTHINGNESS (Q48–Q50)
48. What is nothingness?
Nothingness is not a thing; it has no identity, properties, or causal powers. It is simply the absence of entities. Treating “nothing” as something is a category error and violates the Law of Identity.
49. Can something arise from nothing?
No. “Something from nothing” is a contradiction. Causation presupposes entities; emergence presupposes prior structure. If literally nothing existed, nothing could occur. Existence must exist before action.
50. Can existence be annihilated?
No. Entities can transform or disintegrate, but existence as such cannot cease. There is no boundary beyond which being collapses into nothingness. The annihilation of existence is itself an incoherent concept.
XVII. META-METAPHYSICS (Q51–Q54)
51. What is metaphysics?
Metaphysics is the study of existence as such: the fundamental facts and principles that structure reality. It establishes what must be true in any domain, scale, or context.
52. What is the proper method of metaphysics?
Begin with axioms (existence, identity, consciousness). Never contradict perception. Do not posit entities beyond necessity. Metaphysics must remain grounded in reality, not linguistic or mystical constructions.
53. Are metaphysical disputes substantive?
Yes. Metaphysical errors lead to false understandings of causality, mind, agency, ethics, and politics. Disputes are substantive when they violate identity, evade perception, or smuggle in supernaturalism.
54. What is the relation of metaphysics to physics?
Metaphysics provides the axioms and framework that physics presupposes. Physics describes what exists; metaphysics describes what existence is. Science rests on metaphysical principles even when unconsciously adopted.
XVIII. COSMIC FOUNDATIONS (Q55–Q60)
55. Is ultimate physical reality intelligible?
Yes. Existence and identity are intrinsically intelligible. Reality is not inherently mysterious; limits to knowledge reflect human constraints, not metaphysical chaos.
56. Can existence, time, or causation fail?
Existence and identity cannot fail; they are axiomatic. Causation cannot fail because it is identity in action. What can begin or end are particular causal regimes or physical frameworks, not the principles themselves.
57. Can metaphysics inform cosmology?
Yes. Metaphysics sets non-negotiable boundaries: no creation ex nihilo, no absolute nothingness, no breaks in causality, no timeless origins, no supernatural origins. Cosmology must operate within metaphysical possibility.
58. Is metaphysical necessity knowable?
Yes. Necessity is recognized by reducing concepts to axioms and checking for contradiction. A necessary truth cannot be otherwise without violating identity.
59. Can ultimate reality be paradoxical?
No. Contradictions cannot exist. If something appears paradoxical, either the concept is invalid, the model is wrong, or the language is misleading. Reality contains no genuine contradictions.
60. Can ultimate reality be static?
No. Existence is inherently active; every entity acts according to its identity. A “static reality” would be a reality without identity-driven action—impossible.
XIX. TELEOLOGY (Q61–Q64)
61. Does the universe have a purpose?
No. Purpose requires a conscious agent. The universe is not an agent; it does not will or value. Purpose exists only within living organisms.
62. Does final causation exist?
Yes—but only within life. Living organisms act toward ends (values) required for survival. This teleology is biological, not cosmic or supernatural.
63. What grounds purpose in living things?
The conditional nature of life. Organisms must act in specific ways to sustain themselves. Purpose emerges from the needs of living systems.
64. Do inanimate objects have purpose?
No. Rocks and atoms act by efficient causation, not for ends. Teleology is restricted to organisms that pursue survival-relevant goals.
XX. TRUTH (Q65–Q68)
65. What is truth?
Truth is the correct identification of fact—the alignment of consciousness with reality. It is objective and grounded in identity.
66. Is truth “out there” or “in here”?
Both: facts are out there; truth is the mind’s correct identification of those facts. Truth is the successful conformity between thought and reality.
67. Can contradictions ever be true?
No. A contradiction denies identity. If contradictions were true, identification and thought would collapse. Non-contradiction is the boundary of reality.
68. Is truth discovered or created?
Discovered. We create concepts and models, but the facts they aim to represent exist independently of our thinking.
XXI. MEREOLOGY (Q69–Q72)
69. Is the “Universe” an entity?
No. “Universe” is a collective term for all entities taken together; it is not a single substance with one identity. Only the individual entities within it exist metaphysically.
70. Are composite objects real?
Yes—when their parts function as an integrated, causally unified whole. Composites are derivative but ontologically real. A heart is more than cells; a corporation is not an ontological person.
71. Is society an entity?
No. Society is a network of individuals and relations, not a metaphysical person. Causal powers originate in individuals and their organizations, not in an abstract collective being.
72. Can an object have abstract parts?
No. Parts must be concrete, spatial, and actual. Abstract “parts” are linguistic constructs, not ontological components.
XXII. VALUE, GOOD & EVIL (Q73–Q76)
73. Does evil exist as a substance?
No. Evil is not a thing; it is a privation—a negation or destruction of life-serving value. Evil is parasitic on the good.
74. What is evil?
Evil is any action or condition that destroys or undermines the values a living being requires to live and flourish. It is the violation of the requirements of life.
75. Is Good a Platonic Form?
No. Good is not a transcendent form. Good is relational: X is good for Y under conditions C. It is objective in relation to life, not an intrinsic metaphysical object.
76. Are moral facts independent of life?
No. Values arise only where life faces alternatives and requires ends. Where nothing can be gained or lost, ethics does not apply.
XXIII. SIMULATION, QUALITIES, DEATH (Q77–86)
77. Is logic the boundary of reality?
Yes. Logic is the law of identity applied to thought. No fact can be both A and not-A; denying logic is denying existence.
78. Does Hume’s Problem undermine causation?
No. Hume’s skepticism questions induction; causation is rooted in identity. Knowing what an entity is gives knowledge of how it must act.
79. Can we know metaphysical necessity?
Yes. Necessity is recognized by reducing concepts to axioms and checking for contradiction. If alteration of X would violate its identity, X is necessary.
80. Is an immaterial soul coherent?
No. A non-spatial, non-causal consciousness is incoherent. Consciousness is an attribute of complex biological systems. No brain → no awareness.
81. Is reality mathematical?
No. Mathematics is a tool abstracting structural relations. The world contains structure; it is not constituted by Platonic numbers.
82. What is the relation between essence and existence?
Essence is the conceptual identification of an entity’s fundamental identity; existence is the fact that it is. Essence depends on existence, not vice versa.
83. Can consciousness be reduced to algorithms?
No. Algorithms are symbol manipulations; consciousness is qualitative, integrated, biological awareness. Computation can simulate aspects of cognition but does not by itself instantiate awareness.
84. Is time travel metaphysically possible?
No. Time travel would require causes to precede their conditions—an identity-violating contradiction. The past cannot be altered; the future cannot exist prior to its occurrence.
85. Are boundaries real?
Yes. Boundaries are imposed by identity; they mark what an entity is and is not. Boundaries are metaphysical facts, not mere conventions.
86. What grounds individuality?
Primitive thisness (haecceity). Each entity is numerically distinct by virtue of its identity. Perfect indiscernibility implies one entity, not two.
XXIV. DETERMINISM, INTERACTION, FICTION (Q87–Q94)
87. Is the future determined by the past?
Only outside the domain of volition. Non-conscious entities follow deterministic causality; human agency introduces genuine openness via agent-causal capacities. Nature is determined at the non-volitional level; rational agents are causal origins in their own right at the macroscopic level.
88. Can a non-spatial entity interact with a spatial one?
No. Interaction requires causal contact, which requires spatio-temporal relation. Non-spatial entities cannot have causal efficacy in the spatial world.
89. Primary vs. secondary qualities—are secondary qualities real?
Yes. Secondary qualities (color, taste, sound) are real relational properties arising from the interaction between entities and perceivers. They are not mere illusions; they are objectively grounded in primary qualities plus perceptual apparatus.
90. Is death the absolute end of personal existence?
Yes. When the brain and organism cease their integrated functioning, consciousness ends. There is no survival of the self beyond biological identity.
91. Can two entities share all properties?
No. Perfect indiscernibility collapses into numerical identity—if there is no difference, there is no second entity.
92. Can we be certain reality is not a simulation?
Yes. Doubting perceptual reality presupposes the perceptual axioms it denies. A simulation hypothesis presupposes a real substrate to run the simulation and therefore cannot undercut the primacy of existence.
93. Do fictional objects exist?
No. Fictional objects exist only as conceptual constructs dependent on minds. No minds → no fictional entities.
94. What is force/energy?
Force or energy is the capacity of an entity to act according to its identity. Energy is a property of systems in action, not a substance.
XXV. ULTIMATE LIMITS (Q95–Q100)
95. Does the Principle of Sufficient Reason apply to existence?
No. Existence requires no explanation. The PSR applies to entities within existence, not to existence itself. Existence is the uncaused fact—being itself.
96. Can ultimate reality be unknowable?
No. Reality is knowable because identity is knowable. Limits to knowledge are limits of our epistemic capacities, not metaphysical impenetrability.
97. Are miracles possible?
No. A miracle would be an event without cause or against cause—an identity violation. If something occurs, it occurs according to identity.
98. Do holes exist?
No. A hole is an absence of matter in a configuration; it is a spatial relation, not an entity.
99. Is the cosmos cyclical, singular, or infinite?
The cosmos is eternal. Its particular form may vary across cosmic regimes, but existence itself never began and will not end. Creation ex nihilo is metaphysically impossible.
100. What is the final answer to metaphysics?
Existence exists. Everything else follows from that irreducible fact and from the Law of Identity.
Reality is absolute. Know it. Live by it.