The Missing Ingredient: A Response to Superpsychism

A response to Schneider and Bailey's Superpsychism argues that while their framework correctly identifies key features of a defensible ontology of consciousness, it falls short at five specific points. The Unified Axioconscious Field Theory (UAFT) supplies the missing elements: a single fundamentality, a specified mechanism for phenomenal consciousness, unification of time and gravity as codifferential expressions (gravitytime), a structural mechanism for macro-consciousness emergence (the pinch point), and self-grounding without simulation hypotheses. These bridges complete rather than replace Superpsychism.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Preprint. Submitted to the Journal of Consciousness Studies on April 20, 2026 as a response to the Superpsychism special issue; under review. In "Superpsychism" (Journal of Consciousness Studies 33(1-2), 13-39, https://doi.org/10.53765/20512201.33.1.013), Susan Schneider and Mark Bailey propose that consciousness is fundamental, non-spatio-temporal, and continuous with the prototemporal entangled structure from which spacetime emerges. This response argues that Schneider and Bailey correctly identify several structural features of a defensible ontology of consciousness but stop short at five specific junctures. At each juncture, their framework requires something it does not provide. The Unified Axioconscious Field Theory (UAFT) supplies the missing elements: single fundamentality, a specified mechanism for phenomenal consciousness rather than an unmodified appeal to resonance, the unification of time and gravity as codifferential expressions (gravitytime), a structural mechanism for the emergence of macro-consciousness (the pinch point), and self-grounding without recourse to simulation hypotheses. The bridges developed here do not replace Superpsychism. They complete it.