Every morphogenetic event begins not with what is, but with what could be. In our relational ontology, this is the domain of instantiation: the perspectival cut through a system of potential that makes a phenomenon possible.
Instantiation is not a temporal process in which a system “produces” an instance. Rather, it is a relational shift — a slice through the system’s field of possibilities, bringing a particular configuration into focus. It defines what could be actualised, without yet stabilising it as a recognisable, individuated event.
Consider the examples we explored in our morphogenesis trilogy:
-
In multicellularity, a single cell differentiates within a tissue, actualising a potential role without yet defining the organism’s final form.
-
In superorganisms, an individual begins to occupy a functional role — foraging, guarding, or nurturing — as the colony reads and aligns its behaviour.
-
In language, a gesture or vocalisation emerges, a proto-signal actualised in the shared semiotic field, yet not yet fully integrated into the communal grammar.
In each case, instantiation is the doorway through which relational potential becomes accessible. It creates the possibility for alignment, differentiation, and reflexive integration. But the phenomenon is not yet fully realised; it is a potential cut awaiting its construal.
This is where instantiation meets individuation — the next phase in the relational engine of morphogenesis. Without the cut, nothing can begin; without construal, nothing can persist. Instantiation defines the possible, laying the groundwork for the field to fold back on itself and make the phenomenon this, now, here.
In short, instantiation is the perspectival hinge of morphogenesis: the relational movement that opens potential into the world, the first step in the ongoing interplay that brings life, collectives, and symbolic systems into their emergent forms.
No comments:
Post a Comment