Basic Assumptions:
1. Monad as a Basic Unit:
- Every monad is a divisible, conscious unit of being.
- Monads possess "windows" through which they can experience resonance, neutrality, or rejection.
2. Relationship as a Fundamental Reality:
- The world does not arise from isolated particles, but through dynamic interactions between monads.
- Relationship is primary; physical, biological, and psychological phenomena are expressions of relational dynamics.
3. Syntropy and Entropy:
- Syntropy (Fantappié): Principi di una Teoria Unitaria del Mondo Fisico e Biologico (1944) = ordering, connecting force (analogous to joy/love/affection) that promotes development, order, and coherence.
- Entropy (thermodynamics) = dissolving force (analogous to fear/anger/rejection), which promotes isolation and disintegration.
- Neutrality/Isolation = neither construction nor dissolution.
4. Fantasy as a Mediator:
- Fantasy enables imaginative anticipation of syntropic possibilities.
- The Idea bridges the causality problem of the "reverse time vector" of syntropy: An Idea, with the addition of love, leads to the manifestation of a Temple and a City.
5. Collective Monads:
- Monads can synchronize, establish consensus, and aggregate into larger units.
- Consensus promotes coherent super-monads; conflict/separation dissolves them.
6. Consciousness and Feelings:
- Consciousness is a fundamental property of every monad.
- Feelings convey the quality of relationships (resonance, dissonance, neutrality).
Abstract: This white paper introduces a new metaphysical model, Relatio-Monadology. Building on historical ideas of monads but critically departing from Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz's "windowless" monadology, the model posits that the fundamental units of reality—monads—are not self-contained. Instead, they are actively interconnected through "windows" of relatedness. It argues that these voluntary relationships are the true foundation of the universe and serve as the primordial source for the principles of syntropy (love) and entropy (decay). The model aims to bridge the gap between physical reality and the subjective experience of consciousness and emotions.
Modern science is faced with a fundamental paradox: While physical laws seem to be based on universal principles of decay and entropy, the existence of life reveals an unstoppable tendency towards complexity and order. To overcome this dichotomy, a new framework is needed—one that understands not just matter, but also consciousness and relationships as the fundamental building blocks of reality. Relatio-Monadology offers such a framework, reinterpreting an ancient philosophical idea and bringing it into a dialogue with the insights of modern physics and biology.
The idea of monads as the smallest, indivisible units of being reaches far back into the history of philosophy. For the Pythagoreans, the monad was the cosmic unit, the origin of all numbers and, thus, of all creation. It was the core of everything that is and carried within it the potential for development.
Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) spiritualized the monad, describing it as a dynamic, spiritual unit, a kind of "atom with consciousness." For him, the universe was filled with such living, conscious monads, whose interactions shaped the world. In these early teachings, monads were never isolated; they were active, "ensouled" agents operating in a living, interconnected cosmos.
His ideas were in direct conflict with the authoritarian claims of truth at the time—and ended in persecution and execution.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz faced a central problem: How can two immaterial, simple substances interact with one another without losing their simplicity or perfection? His answer, the Monadology, was brilliant but uncompromising. He posited that monads are "windowless"—they have no way of communicating directly with or being influenced by other monads. Instead, they are programmed in a pre-established harmony by God, in which each monad undergoes its own internal development. Their apparent interaction is an illusion, born from their perfect synchronicity.
In doing so, Leibniz stripped monads of what we would call their "soul"—their ability for direct relationships and emotional exchange. He did this to keep his metaphysical system logically consistent. He sacrificed the possibility of genuine, felt relationships to preserve the mathematical precision and independence of his monads and to solve the problem of mind-body interaction. The result was a universe of millions of perfectly synchronized but lonely clocks.
Leibniz’s decision to conceptualize monads as “windowless” and to place God’s harmony at the center can also be interpreted as a reaction to Giordano Bruno’s fate and the cultural climate of the time: It was his own attempt to combine metaphysical creativity with theological and political conformity.
Relatio-Monadology fundamentally revises Leibniz's premise. It suggests that the window to the world not only exists but is the monad's very purpose. In this model, reality is not the result of a pre-established harmony but the constant, dynamic creation from the voluntary relationships between monads.
Love is the primordial force that opens these windows and brings monads into a state of connectedness. It is the syntropic matrix of the universe. In contrast, anger (or decay) is the resistance to this connectedness as well as the tendency to close the windows and return to isolation.
Every observable structure, from the gravity that binds planets together to the coordinated dance of cells in a biological organism, is a physical expression of this relational dynamic. In Relatio-Monadology, the universe is not a collection of isolated particles but a living, breathing network of relationships. Emotions are the language in which monads communicate with each other.
Relatio-Monadology offers an alternative explanation for some of the greatest mysteries of science:
This model is not intended to replace established science but to provide it with a metaphysical foundation that does justice to the human experience of meaning, love, and connectedness. It is a call to view the universe not as a dead machine but as a living organism whose existence depends on the quality of its relationships.
Relatio-Monadology introduces a paradigm shift: It understands the universe not as a collection of silent units but as a living fabric of resonances. To illustrate the significance of this model, four central aspects will be explored in more detail: the nature of the window, resonance, the understanding of consciousness, and the practical dimension of a syntropic ethic.
The window is not a physical opening but an ontological resonance surface. It is the area where the monad does not retreat into itself but relates its existence to that of another. This window does not allow for the transfer of substance but for the exchange of relational information. Analogous to quantum entanglement, one could say that monads attune to each other through the window—not through a material medium, but through an act of synchronous coherence.
The window is not passive; it is a decision, a choice: openness or closedness, syntropy or entropy, love or isolation. The relationship is not a side effect but the monad's true purpose.
The monad’s window is not merely a switch between "on" and "off." It holds a deeper dialectic that encompasses the entire spectrum of relationships. Resonance is not one-dimensional; it can be affirming, neutralizing, or rejecting.
The universe reveals itself as a dialectical field of resonance, in which three fundamental modes can be distinguished:
Syntropy (Love / Affirmation):
The monad opens its window in harmony. It affirms and amplifies the flow, contributing to the densification of order. From this resonance, trust, growth, and creative evolution emerge.
Neutrality (Isolation / Silence):
The monad closes its window. Neither creation nor destruction takes place—an absence of exchange. Isolation is not destructive, but it is not creative either; it means stagnation.
Entropy (Rejection / Counter-Resonance):
The window is open, but the response is out of phase. The monad sends a counter-movement that creates dissonance and reinforces separation. This rejection is entropic because it dissolves bonds and weakens coherence.
This trichotomy reveals the playing field of existence. Resonance is not only affirmation but also silence or resistance. Each choice is a creative act that changes the texture of the universe.
Ontologically, this shows that relationships persist even in resistance: The monads are still connected, even if disharmoniously.
Cosmically, this tension creates a field of friction that can, in turn, initiate transformation. For every rejection forces a reordering, and every "no" contains the possibility of a deeper "yes" later on.
The dialectic of resonance reveals that the monad's freedom is not just to open or close itself, but also to shape the quality of its response. Resonance is not just consonance but a creative field of decision—affirmation, silence, or rejection.
While panpsychism attributes consciousness to every thing, Relatio-Monadology distinguishes between the monad's elementary quality of consciousness and the relational consciousness that arises from the opening of its windows. Each monad carries within it a tone, a voice of being. However, it is only in the harmony of many voices that the melody of consciousness arises, which we perceive as experience, feeling, and meaning.
Consciousness is therefore less a substance and more a verb—an event that expresses itself in the language of relationships. It is the common space that emerges when monads open their resonance surfaces to one another.
If reality lives on relationships, then ethics becomes the art of cultivating resonance. The highest moral task is not to blindly follow laws but to strengthen syntropic connections—in society, in economics, and in technology.
In politics, this means creating systems that allow for openness and permeability, rather than cementing power in isolation. Democracy would then not only be a majority decision but a resonance architecture.
In economics, it means measuring value not primarily as profit, but as the ability to generate mutual enablement. Markets thus become networks of sharing and amplifying, not just of trading.
Finally, in technology, the challenge is to make tools not instruments of isolation but extensions of the windows—media that strengthen connectedness rather than weakening it.
The ethics of Relatio-Monadology can be summarized in a simple principle: Actions are good when they increase syntropic resonance fields.