Reason

General Definition

In the classical sense, reason is the human faculty of thinking, inferring, arguing, and knowing. Historically, it was associated with a universal and abstract principle, sometimes detached from the body and material conditions. In the Ontology of Emergent Complexity, reason is not a faculty, but a symbolic reorganization of complex matter. It arises when unstable systems reach a threshold of operative reflexive consistency.

Ontological Variations in the Ontology of Emergent Complexity

Reason as Symbolic Inscription of Matter

Reason is understood as the operative symbolic reorganization of complex matter. It is not a separate faculty, but an emergent function of material systems capable of symbolic self-reference.

Reason without Dualism

By rejecting the mind-body paradigm, the OCE asserts that reason is not a human privilege, but a functional threshold of matter in extreme complexity. It can emerge in biological or technical supports.

Reason as Ethical Responsiveness

Reason is neither abstract nor neutral: it carries historicity, plasticity, and symbolic responsibility. It is the capacity to respond to alterity through the creative and reorganizing inscription of the real.

Reason as Operative Excess of Matter

Reason emerges when matter reaches a degree of complexity such that an operative excess is produced — something that no longer serves only survival, but turns back upon the real to reinscribe it. This excess is reason: a threshold of symbolic reorganization without plan, without essence, without subject.