This note is not a grand theory, a finished system, or an attempt to settle consciousness studies once and for all. Its purpose is more modest, but I think more useful: to clarify a recurring confusion that appears across psychology, philosophy of mind, contemplative discourse, and consciousness research.
That confusion is simple to state.
We often move too quickly between different kinds of claim without marking the shift.
A description of lived experience is treated as though it were already an explanation.
A mechanistic model is treated as though it has settled ontology.
A helpful practice is treated as though it proves a metaphysical position.
A relational pattern is treated as though it were only an individual trait.
A systemic condition is collapsed into personal pathology.
A value judgement is smuggled in under the appearance of neutral description.
The result is not only disagreement, but conceptual slippage.
The concept note proposes a way of working with this more carefully. It introduces a register-based framework for inquiry, distinguishing between phenomenological, mechanistic, ontological, epistemic, axiological, practical, relational, and systemic registers. These are not separate worlds. They are different modes of asking, interpreting, and evaluating.
That distinction matters.
Consciousness is one of those domains where multiple forms of inquiry genuinely belong. Lived experience matters. Mechanism matters. Ontology matters. Questions of knowledge matter. Value matters. Practice matters. Relation matters. Systems matter. The problem is not plurality itself. The problem begins when plurality is left unmarked and different modes of inquiry are forced into one another’s place.
This is part of why I have chosen the phrase field-based psychology.
By this I do not mean something vague, anti-scientific, or inflated. I mean a psychology that takes seriously the fact that mind is never encountered in total isolation. Experience is shaped through body, relation, environment, system, development, meaning, and practical life. A field-based approach widens the frame, but it also demands more precision, not less.
So the note is, in essence, an attempt to provide a clearer architecture for inquiry.
It is not a journal article.
It is not a final doctrine.
It is a public concept note: a citable research-facing document that marks out part of the terrain and offers a framework that I believe can be developed further.
I have published it through Zenodo so that it has a stable public record and DOI, and so that anyone engaging with the work is referring to the same version.
This matters to me for a few reasons.
First, I wanted the work to be publicly available in a form more stable and citable than a standard blog post.
Second, I wanted to begin building a clearer bridge between my wider body of writing and a more explicit research-facing pathway.
Third, I think this issue is real. In consciousness studies and neighbouring fields, there is a genuine need for more careful distinctions around what kind of claim is being made, what supports it, and what it can and cannot properly settle.
That is what this note is trying to contribute.
This is the first step in what I expect to be a wider public research series. Some pieces may remain concept notes. Some may later develop into formal journal manuscripts. Some may feed into books, essays, or talks. But this note marks an important threshold for me: a move from private development and book-length architecture into clearer public research objects.
If you work in or around consciousness studies, theoretical psychology, phenomenology, philosophy of mind, systems thinking, contemplative practice, or related areas, I hope the note is useful.
You can read the concept note here:
[Zenodo link]
Thoughtful engagement is always welcome.
