The Principle of Structural Dependence: An Organisational Constraint for Models of Awareness
Alison Jane King, Darryl Gray
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) August 16, 2026 preprint DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19751804 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Topics | Addiction |
| Key points | Argues that the Principle of Structural Dependence (PSD) provides a necessary constraint for explanations of awareness, requiring that measurable differences in a capacity correspond to differences in supporting organization. Proposes that PSD can generate shared empirical tests across competing theories of consciousness, and specifies conditions under which it could be falsified. |
Abstract
This manuscript develops the Principle of Structural Dependence (PSD) as a general organisational constraint for theories and empirical models of awareness and cognitive capacities. PSD proposes that measurable differences in a capacity require corresponding differences in the organisation relevant to supporting that capacity. The principle is deliberately modest: it does not specify what consciousness fundamentally is, nor does it claim that organisational change is sufficient for a particular conscious state. Instead, it identifies structural dependence as a necessary constraint that candidate explanations of awareness should satisfy. The paper develops PSD from a conceptual principle into an operational and falsifiable framework. It defines capacity-relative supporting organisation, introduces measurement thresholds for empirical testing, addresses questions of scale and granularity, and specifies conditions under which the principle could be challenged or falsified. Evidence and potential applications are considered across anaesthesia, sleep and dreaming, disorders of consciousness, neurodegeneration, development, comparative cognition, and computational systems. Particular attention is given to perturbation-based approaches, ordered vulnerability of different capacities, recovery trajectories, and the distinction between organisational variables that are constitutively relevant and additional variables that may improve prediction without replacing structural dependence. The manuscript also examines how PSD can be used as a model-comparison constraint across competing theories of consciousness. Rather than proposing another complete theory of consciousness, PSD is intended as a higher-order principle that can generate shared empirical tests across otherwise different theoretical frameworks. PSD is related to, but not dependent upon, the authors’ previously developed C–A Framework. Within that framework, it provides a formal way of investigating how different capacities of awareness depend upon different forms and levels of organisation. Version 2 substantially strengthens the manuscript’s operational formulation, empirical testing strategy, falsification criteria, treatment of measurement and granularity, and proposed research programme.
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