Journal of Systems Thinking · Volume 6, Issue 1 · 2026-09-17
The Original Sin of Dualism
What if Epistemology and Ontology are the Same Thing? What if Models are Reality Organizing Reality?
Derek Cabrera, Laura Cabrera
DOI 10.54120/jost.v26i1.dc6eost6 (registration pending)
Abstract
ABSTRACT: What if epistemology and ontology are not two different things? What if models are reality organizing reality? Philosophy repeatedly draws the same basic line: mind/body, mind/nature, model/reality, epistemology/ontology. These distinctions are useful for talking, but they become misleading when treated as evidence that reality is divided into fundamentally different kinds. O-Theory starts from a simpler claim: thinking is the organization of information into meaning or mental models, M = I·O, where the organizational operator is O = DSRP-484. If the same organizational primitives also characterize reality, then R = I·O. The critical point is that the O on both sides is the same. Mind is therefore not a special substance standing outside reality and attempting to represent it. Mind is one organized part of reality interacting with and modeling other organized parts of reality. More strongly, if reality is recursively composed of information-organizing systems, R = {M1, M2, ..., Mn}, with each Mi = Ii·O, then what we call “mind” is one local manifestation of a process occurring throughout reality. In that sense, M = R modeling R. This reframes the classical mind/body, mind/nature, model/reality, and epistemology/ontology problems as variations of the same mistaken dualism: a useful distinction within one reality mistaken for a division between different kinds of reality. O-Theory therefore does not propose a bridge between mind and world. It proposes that the apparent divide is explanatory, while the deeper unity lies in the shared organizational structure.
© 2026 Journal of Systems Thinking (JoST) · CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
