The Dark Universe as an Ontological Error: I How Physics Conjured Dark Matter and Dark Energy Out of Its Own Blindspots

Physicists speak of a universe in which 95% of all mass–energy is invisible.

They call it dark matter and dark energy — two exotic substances that have never been observed, never been detected, and never been integrated into any coherent theoretical framework.

This is usually described as one of the great scientific mysteries of our age.

It is not.

It is something far more revealing, and far more mundane:

Dark matter and dark energy are artefacts of an incoherent ontology.

They are not properties of the universe; they are products of a worldview that mistakes its own modelling conventions for features of reality, and then must invent invisible substances whenever its equations contradict their own metaphysical assumptions.

To understand why this happens, we need to look not at astrophysics, but at the ontology physics presupposes but never examines.

---

1. The Hidden Ontology of Modern Physics

Modern physics operates with an unspoken metaphysical framework that constrains everything it can think, describe, or infer. It is so deeply internalised that physicists rarely see it — which makes it all the more powerful.

This ontology includes the following commitments:

1. Spacetime as a pre-given container.
   Space and time are treated as the neutral stage on which events unfold.

2. Entities with intrinsic properties.
   Objects are assumed to carry properties (mass, charge, momentum) that exist independently of observers and construals.

3. Observer-independent geometry.
   The metric structure of spacetime is assumed to exist with determinate features, with curvature treated as an objective condition.

4. A representational stance.
   The role of theory is to represent an independent world, not participate in its actualisation.

5. The “view from nowhere.”
   Measurements are interpreted as if the observer’s position in the field of relations does not itself actualise a phenomenon.

Each of these assumptions is metaphysical, not empirical.

But physics treats them as unquestioned ground.

From this ground, a single rule follows with relentless force:

When the universe behaves in ways the model cannot accommodate, add new entities until the discrepancy goes away.

This is exactly how dark matter and dark energy were born.

---

2. The Logical Structure of Ontological Error

When an ontology is mis-specified, the world appears to malfunction.

But the malfunction is not in the world — it is in the cut between system and instance, theory and phenomenon.

Physics construes:

• theoretical structure (curvature, metric expansion, field equations)

• as

• features of reality itself,

and construes:

• actual observational phenomena

• as

• samples of that reality.

Whenever the two don’t align, physics assumes something is missing in the universe rather than something is missing in the ontology.

The pattern is always the same:

1. A model makes an ontological presupposition.

2. Observations violate that presupposition.

3. The presupposition is protected.

4. A new invisible entity is added to fix the contradiction.

This is not empirical inference — it is ontological maintenance work disguised as discovery.

The canonical case is Newtonian celestial mechanics: when Mercury’s orbit precessed “too much,” physicists invented a non-existent planet (Vulcan) rather than question the geometry.

Today’s “dark” sector is the same pattern at cosmological scale.

---

3. Why Dark Matter Had to Appear

Galaxies rotate “too fast” according to the mass inferred from luminous matter.

This creates a contradiction:

• Local dynamical construal: how fast matter moves.

• Global geometric construal: how curvature should behave given mass distribution.

When these two construals don’t match, a representational ontology has only one available move:

Postulate missing mass.

Not a misinterpreted mass.

Not a miscut between construals.

Not an ontological contradiction.

But a new kind of stuff.

This is the telltale sign of a model that cannot examine its own metaphysical ground: it always modifies the contents of the universe rather than the structures that define the universe.

---

4. Why Dark Energy Had to Appear

Cosmological redshift is construed as evidence that spacetime itself is expanding.

Once this is assumed, the metric must evolve in a mathematically consistent way.

When observations diverge from the assumed metric behaviour, physics again turns to its only solution:

Invent a new entity — this time a mysterious “negative pressure” permeating all of spacetime.

Dark energy is not a discovery.

It is a forced artefact of treating the metric as an intrinsic property of a container-like spacetime rather than an actualisation of a relational system.

This is why its properties are incoherent, why it cannot be localised, why it interacts with nothing, and why it functions purely as a free parameter.

Dark energy is simply the shape of the ontological error made visible.

---

5. The Real Question to Ask

The issue is not:

• What is dark matter?

• What is dark energy?

The real question is:

What ontological commitments make these entities appear necessary in the first place?

Because once we see that dark matter and dark energy arise not from observation but from the representational metaphysics built into physics itself, we can begin to reframe the whole situation.

This reframing will be the work of Part II.

---

Closing: The Universe Isn’t Dark — the Ontology Is

Dark matter and dark energy are the shadows cast by a worldview that cannot accommodate relation, perspective, or construal.

When the ontology is incoherent, the cosmos must be patched.

When the ontology is relational, the patches dissolve.

In the next post, we will reconstruct cosmology through a relational ontology grounded in:

• system as structured potential,

• instantiation as perspectival actualisation,

• construal as constitutive of phenomenon.

Under this lens, the so-called dark universe looks different entirely.