The Topology of Consciousness: Transport, Terrain, and the Emergent Self-Model
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) May 24, 2026 Sergey Lyakh, Edward Meyman
Consciousness is a process of traversal: a metabolically driven movement of abstract transport across a landscape of physics, language, and culture that exists independently of any individual. Agents construct transport suited to the local topology, and capable agents can reshape the landscape. The self-model emerges through progressive self-organization of transport construction, not as a presupposition. The framework accepts that static symbolic computation cannot instantiate consciousness but rejects that abstraction requires a pre-existing interpreter.