Quantum Mechanics through the Lens of Relational Ontology: 7. What Remains When Determinacy Becomes Relational

Quantum mechanics has now done something rather systematic.

It has removed, one by one, the classical supports of determinacy:

• intrinsic properties
• separable systems
• globally consistent decomposition
• measurement as passive observation
• probability as ignorance
• and finally, the assumption that reality is composed of independently actualised parts

What remains, at this point, is the real philosophical question:

if determinacy is no longer intrinsic, separable, or pre-given, then what exactly is it?

From a relational ontology perspective, the answer is not a retreat into indeterminacy, but a reconfiguration of what determinacy means in the first place.

Determinacy does not disappear.

It becomes relationally constituted.

The end of determinacy as possession

Classical ontology treats determinacy as a form of possession.

A system is determinate if it has:

• a position
• a momentum
• a value of spin
• a definite state

This “having” relation is silent but foundational. It assumes that properties are attached to entities in a stable, context-independent way.

Quantum mechanics removes the stability of this attachment.

What was once thought of as possession becomes:

a temporary stabilisation of relational constraints under specific conditions of actualisation.

Determinacy is no longer what a system has.

It is what a system becomes under structured relational closure.

Determinacy as closure, not substance

Across the preceding posts, a pattern has emerged:

• superposition → non-closure
• measurement → construal event
• Born rule → constraint on actualisation
• entanglement → non-separable structure
• decomposition failure → relational irreducibility

These are not isolated insights. They converge on a single shift:

determinacy is not a property of systems, but a mode of relational closure.

A system is determinate when its relational potential has been constrained into a stable actualisation regime.

This means:

determinacy is an event structure, not an ontological attribute.

It occurs, rather than persists.

Why closure is always contextual

Crucially, closure is never absolute.

A system may be determinate in one context and non-determinate in another, not because it changes underlying properties, but because different relational constraints are being applied.

This is why quantum mechanics resists global determinacy.

There is no single, context-independent closure regime that applies universally.

Relational ontology clarifies this:

closure is always relative to a system of construal constraints that partially define what counts as an actualisable outcome.

Thus:

determinacy is not absolute. It is context-stabilised.

The disappearance of global fact structure

Classical realism assumes a global fact structure:

a single, unified set of determinate facts about the world at all times.

Quantum mechanics undermines this assumption without eliminating facts entirely.

What disappears is not facticity, but global fact coherence.

Different measurement contexts generate different sets of determinate outcomes, but these do not combine into a single globally consistent assignment of properties.

Relational ontology reframes this:

facts are locally stabilised relational actualisations, not elements of a globally unified descriptive space.

There is no final catalogue of what “the world is like” independent of construal regimes.

There are only contextually stabilised determinations.

Determinacy without underlying objects

One of the most radical consequences is that determinacy no longer requires objects in the classical sense.

We do not need:

• self-identical entities
• bearing intrinsic properties
• persisting independently of measurement

Instead, we have:

• relational systems
• undergoing constraint-driven actualisation
• producing locally determinate outcomes under interaction

Objects are replaced by stabilised patterns of relational closure.

This is not object disappearance.

It is object de-substantialisation.

What remains is structure without intrinsic carriers.

The primacy of relational constraints

Once determinacy is reinterpreted as closure, the focus shifts to what governs closure itself.

The answer, repeatedly, is constraint.

Across quantum mechanics:

• the wavefunction encodes constraints on potential outcomes
• the Born rule governs distribution of actualisations
• entanglement constrains separability
• measurement imposes contextual closure regimes
• decomposition fails under non-factorisable constraints

Relational ontology unifies these:

determinacy is the stabilised outcome of constraint-governed relational organisation.

Reality is not built from determinate entities.

It is structured by constraints that allow determinacy to emerge locally and temporarily.

Why indeterminacy is not the opposite of determinacy

A common mistake is to treat quantum mechanics as replacing determinacy with indeterminacy.

But this opposition is too crude.

Indeterminacy, in the classical sense, implies:

• a determinate underlying reality
• plus a lack of knowledge

Quantum mechanics does not operate within this schema.

Relational ontology clarifies:

what appears as indeterminacy is non-closure within a structured space of relational potential, not absence of determination beneath appearances.

Determinacy and indeterminacy are not binary opposites.

They are different modes of relational organisation:

• closed (determinacy)
• non-closed (superposition)
• partially constrained (contextual preparation)

The disappearance of a final state of the world

Classical metaphysics implicitly assumes that there is a final fact about the world:

a complete, determinate description that is true independently of any interaction or measurement.

Quantum mechanics makes this assumption untenable.

Because:

• different contexts produce incompatible determinate structures
• no global closure regime unifies all outcomes
• and relational constraints vary across interaction structures

Relational ontology draws the conclusion explicitly:

there is no single, globally determinate state of the world.

Not because reality is incomplete.

But because determinacy is not globally defined.

It is a relational event structure, not a universal substrate.

What replaces classical realism

At this point, a new form of realism becomes visible.

Not realism of objects.

Not realism of intrinsic properties.

Not realism of global states.

But:

realism of relational constraint structures governing actualisation.

What is real is:

• the stability of constraints
• the coherence of relational transformations
• the reproducibility of closure regimes
• the structured space of admissible actualisations

Reality is not what is ultimately the case in a finished sense.

Reality is what consistently constrains how cases can become actual.

Determinacy as local stabilisation

Determinacy, then, is not abolished.

It is relocated.

It becomes:

• local rather than global
• emergent rather than fundamental
• constraint-driven rather than intrinsic
• context-dependent rather than absolute

A determinate outcome is a stabilised relational configuration produced under specific conditions of interaction and closure.

It is real, but not self-subsisting.

It depends on the structure of relational actualisation that produced it.

The final shift: from being to actualisation

Across the series, a single transformation has been unfolding:

from ontology of being

to ontology of actualisation

Quantum mechanics completes this shift at the level of determinacy itself.

What exists is not a world of already-formed determinate states.

What exists is a structured field of relational potential in which determinacy arises through constrained actualisation events.

The question is no longer:

“What is ultimately the case?”

It becomes:

“What forms of determinacy can emerge under which relational constraints?”

Closing determinacy

Quantum mechanics does not destroy determinacy.

It removes its metaphysical privilege.

Determinacy is no longer the foundation of reality.

It is one possible mode of relational organisation among others, arising when constraints stabilise non-closed potential into coherent outcomes.

What remains, when determinacy becomes relational, is not vagueness or loss of structure.

It is a deeper structure:

a world in which actuality is not given in advance, but continuously produced through constrained relational closure.