Continuous creation and renewal: SMM/DTT and Integrated information theory

01The question behind the comparison

Continuous creation is a claim about dependence: the world does not sustain itself independently of its source once an initial act is finished. SMM/DTT develops a temporal version in which observable configurations are renewed through inner generation and outer completion. This can make persistence a dynamic achievement rather than the passive endurance of an unchanged material core. The central question is how novelty and reliable continuity coexist. A renewed world must explain why yesterday’s records constrain today’s events.

Renewal has several possible meanings. An entity may remain numerically the same while its properties change. A pattern may persist through replacement of its material components. A new token may reproduce an earlier form while inheriting a causal history. A metaphysical account may hold that all three depend continuously on a source without describing replacement in physical time. DTT is most distinctive when it specifies which of these meanings belongs to its generative law and which belongs to its theological interpretation. The difference matters for conservation laws and for the identity of persons.

The six inner levels should therefore include an account of retained structure, not merely a series of creative names. If nothing is retained, repeated creation produces disconnected worlds. If a complete archive is carried unchanged, the model must explain where that archive belongs and how its resources scale. A finite observer can preserve limited records while older details become inaccessible. This suggests a constructive middle ground: lawful renewal can preserve the relations required for stable experience without retaining every microscopic feature in every accessible record.

02The single-source and nested-time proposal

SMM begins with one nonspatial generative source. DTT distinguishes its inner production from the outer order in which completed results become accessible. The six inner levels are nested functional dependencies within that production; the seventh denotes outer completion. They are not six independent clocks, six spatial directions, or six simultaneously occupied temporal axes. This distinction makes the framework more specific than a general claim that everything changes: it asks how a world of persistent relations can be generated before its spatial representation is taken for granted. ^[2]

03The comparator’s explanatory structure

IIT proposes that experience corresponds to an intrinsic, irreducible cause-effect structure. Its formal analysis concerns a specified system, its state and counterfactual transitions under a chosen modelling scale. It should not be reduced to the claim that more stored bits mean more consciousness. Integration, information and the identification of a subject are separate requirements within the programme.

Consider two independent memory banks storing the same file. Their data agree, but agreement is not the same as an integrated causal organization. Connecting them through reciprocal operations changes the causal model even if the visible file remains the same. This distinction is useful for SMM/DTT: a common source or a completed archive need not constitute one conscious subject. A bridge to IIT would require a transition structure and an account of system boundaries, then a reason to accept IIT’s proposed identity with experience. The mathematical calculation and that identity claim should remain distinguishable. ^[1]

04The precise agreement and difference

IIT evaluates intrinsic cause-effect organization for a specified system and state. DTT’s renewal concerns how such systems and states are generated across completions. The theories therefore meet at persistence of organization: if a substrate is repeatedly renewed, what makes its later integrated structure a continuation of the earlier one? A static count of stored information cannot answer this.

A model could preserve the same transition relations while replacing component tokens, much as an abstract circuit can be realized by different hardware. IIT’s analysis would depend on the actual causal organization, not merely the persistence of a drawing. DTT must consequently specify whether renewal preserves counterfactual powers as well as observed outputs. This is a useful strengthening: a source-generated world should reproduce how systems respond to interventions, not only how they look in one history. The comparison also leaves personal persistence open. Even a stable integrated structure does not settle every philosophical question about the same subject surviving renewal. DTT can clarify the physical continuity before making the stronger experiential claim. ^[1]

05Worked example: what follows and what does not

A river maintains a recognizable course while different parcels of water pass through it. Calling it the same river can track location, causal continuity, ecological organization or a legal identity. None requires the same water molecules to remain. Now imagine a sequence of perfectly similar rivers with no causal relation between them. Similarity alone would not supply the history of one river. The comparison shows what a renewal theory needs: an inheritance relation that explains why a later configuration continues this process. SMM/DTT can express that relation through source memory and completion. The analogy establishes a criterion for persistence, not a physical proof that the universe is recreated in discrete frames.

06What this comparison contributes

The strongest version of renewal explains stability rather than merely challenging it. It identifies what is invariant across completions, what can vary, and why one completed state counts as the successor of another. Philosophical traditions differ over whether the dependence is temporal, ontological or both. Comparing these options gives DTT a clearer account of creation without forcing every language of sustaining dependence into the mathematics of a rapid physical update.

THE SAME QUESTION, DIFFERENT STARTING POINTS

The comparison at a glance

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