In this post, we explore how a relational ontology reframes causality—not as a chain of collisions, but as a pattern of constraint within a distributed field of potential.
1. Classical Causality and Its Limits
In the classical view:
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Causality is local: interactions occur through direct contact or mediation (e.g. force fields),
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It is linear: A causes B, which causes C,
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It assumes separability: the cause exists independently of the effect until their interaction.
Quantum theory disrupts all three:
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Entanglement violates locality: changes in one system correlate with another regardless of spatial separation,
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Superposition undermines linearity: multiple outcomes co-exist prior to actualisation,
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Measurement context affects what is realised—suggesting that the system cannot be separated from the act of observation.
2. Constraint as the Basis for Relational Causality
A relational ontology replaces linear causation with constraint-driven actualisation:
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Systems are not pushed by causes but shaped by constraints—conditions that modulate which outcomes are possible,
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Actualisation occurs within a structured field of potential, and what emerges depends on the coherence of that structure,
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"Causality" becomes a shorthand for tracing how relational tensions resolve—not who did what to whom.
This aligns more closely with:
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The logic of path-dependence and field effects,
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The idea of retrocausality in some interpretations, where future measurement settings influence past correlations,
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The notion that conditions of coherence matter more than discrete events.
3. Quantum Examples of Relational Influence
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In delayed choice experiments, a measurement made after a particle “should have” passed through an apparatus still determines its behaviour—suggesting that causal order is not fundamental,
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In quantum teleportation, no energy or signal traverses the space between entangled particles, yet coherence is preserved,
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These phenomena suggest that relational structure governs behaviour more than temporal sequencing.
Thus, influence operates through the relational topology of the system, not through energy transfer across space and time.
4. Revisiting Cause and Effect
Under relational constraint:
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"Effect" is not what follows a cause in time, but what resolves within a network of possibilities,
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"Cause" is not an initiating force, but a shift in the configuration of constraints that alters the potential landscape,
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Causality becomes intra-systemic: it expresses how the system reorganises itself under tension.
We are no longer mapping forces acting on objects but trajectories of coherence through a shifting field.
5. Implications for Science and Society
This reconception invites:
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A science of emergence and modulation, not just control and prediction,
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An ethics of attunement to constraint, rather than command over causes,
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A view of agency as participation in coherence, not imposition of will.
It also demands new epistemologies—tools for tracking entangled transformations, not merely linear sequences.
Closing
The quantum world is not governed by billiard-ball causality. It unfolds through patterned constraint, through mutual influence and systemic tension. A relational ontology helps us name this differently: causality becomes a question not of impact, but of resonance—not of origin, but of coherence under shifting possibility.
In the next post, we’ll step back and reflect on how these ontological revisions affect the nature of explanation itself: What counts as a scientific explanation when the world is no longer made of separable parts?
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