The case of inflation in cosmology and the case of faster-than-light signalling in quantum entanglement expose the same ontological faultline. Each problem arises from the literalisation of potential as if it were a physical history, and each is patched by positing hidden processes or entities to restore coherence. From the perspective of relational ontology, however, neither problem needs solving. Both simply dissolve once we reconstrue system and instance in relational terms.
Inflation’s Three Problems
The inflationary hypothesis was introduced to resolve three puzzles in early-universe cosmology: the horizon problem, the flatness problem, and the monopole problem. Each one presupposes that coherence across the cosmos requires causal mediation within spacetime.
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Horizon problem: Different regions of the cosmic microwave background should not have been in causal contact, yet they exhibit the same temperature.
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Flatness problem: The universe appears almost perfectly spatially flat, though small deviations in early curvature should have grown dramatically.
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Monopole problem: Grand unified theories predict relic particles (monopoles) in the early universe, but none are observed.
Inflation “solves” these puzzles by positing an episode of exponential expansion, driven by a hypothetical scalar inflaton field, which puts regions into contact, smooths curvature, and dilutes relics.
Entanglement’s Dilemma
Quantum entanglement poses a parallel difficulty. Measurements on one particle are perfectly correlated with measurements on its partner, even across vast distances where no signal could travel at or below the speed of light. This looks like “spooky action at a distance,” in Einstein’s words.
Mainstream responses have included hidden variables, faster-than-light signals, or a hand-waving appeal to “nonlocality.” In each case, coherence is still conceived as something that must be mediated, enforced, or transmitted.
A Parallel Table
Here the symmetry becomes clear:
| Problem | Mainstream Framing | Patch / Solution | Relational Dissolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Horizon problem | Distant regions of the CMB should never have been in causal contact, yet are uniform. | Inflation: early exponential expansion put them in contact. | Uniformity is perspectival coherence of the cosmos as an instance of potential. Coherence does not require past causal contact. |
| Flatness problem | Universe appears finely tuned to be spatially flat. Small early deviations should grow. | Inflation: expansion “irons out” curvature. | Flatness is an alignment of construal, not a physical state needing dynamical enforcement. No fine-tuning is required. |
| Monopole problem | GUTs predict relics (monopoles), but none are observed. | Inflation: dilutes relics beyond observability. | Monopoles are misconstrued projections of theory as substance. Their non-appearance is not a “problem.” |
| FTL signalling problem | Entangled particles exhibit instantaneous correlations across spacelike separations. | Ad hoc explanations: hidden variables, superluminal signals, or “spooky action at a distance.” | Entanglement is one cut across potential. Correlation is systemic alignment, not mediated communication. |
The Ontological Fallacy
What unites these cases is a shared fallacy:
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Literalisation of system as history: potential is misconstrued as if it were a literal sequence of states in spacetime.
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Misplaced demand for mediation: coherence is assumed to require signals, fields, or episodes to enforce alignment.
Relational Dissolution
In relational ontology, system is a structured potential, and instance is a perspectival cut. Spacetime itself is not a container in which causal interactions occur, but a construal that emerges with the cut. Coherence is therefore a property of alignment, not of transmission.
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The cosmic microwave background is uniform because the cosmos as instance is a single construal of potential, not because regions once exchanged photons in a hidden epoch.
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Quantum entanglement exhibits correlation because both particles are actualisations of the same system potential, not because signals dart invisibly between them.
What inflation and faster-than-light signalling problems both reveal is not a deficiency in physics, but a deficiency in ontology. By misreading potential as history and construal as substance, physics generates paradoxes that then demand ad hoc patches. When reconstrued relationally, the paradoxes vanish.
Beyond the Patches
The symmetry between inflation and entanglement is not accidental. It shows that cosmology and quantum theory, in their most ambitious formulations, are both pressing against the same ontological boundary. Each discipline is trying to secure coherence in a framework that misconstrues potential as a literal history, and construal as a substance in need of causal mediation.
Inflation, with its inflaton field, and quantum entanglement, with its imagined faster-than-light signals, are not discoveries about the world. They are narrative patches, artefacts of an ontology stretched past breaking point. The paradoxes they aim to resolve dissolve once we shift perspective:
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System as potential. The cosmos is not a history that must be smoothed, but a structured potential that actualises perspectivally.
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Instance as cut. Coherence is not enforced by contact, but given in the alignment of construal.
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Construal as constitutive. Reality is not waiting beneath misconstrual to be revealed, but is constituted in the very act of construing.
From this vantage, cosmology and quantum theory converge. Both are tracing the contours of the same symbolic architecture — a reflexive reality in which coherence is not transmitted but aligned, not imposed but actualised.
The problems of inflation and faster-than-light signalling are therefore not puzzles to be solved, but symptoms of an ontology to be outgrown. Relational ontology offers the way through: not a new patch, but a new cut.
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