VGF Articles
On the Wider Application of the IIP-VGF Framework
RNA World in the VGF Framework
Background
In the IIP-VGF framework we model any structure or dynamic in nature in terms of the VGF, which is the vast generative field of closures or attractors that arises from the principle of infinite iteration or self-recurrence. This is the VGF attractor landscape. The "starting point" is literally the infinite iteration principle itself (IIP) which is simply the abstract principle of infinite self-recurrence. Within the approach, in principle modern mathematics itself is already downstream of the "starting point" (the IIP) and consists of structures and relations that have already stabilised within the VGF. Modern mathematics can then be used post hoc to examine the VGF.
The alpha - beta - gamma formation central to the framework derives from the quadratic tensor recursor that generalises the structure of infinite self-recurrence.
Alpha is the regime of the self-recurrence or iteration itself.
Beta is the regime of proto closures and closures in the iteration or self-recurrence. These are already subject to the evolutionary principle of "what survives" in the attractor landscape, long before what we would ordinarily recognise as objects and structures of the kind that empirical science studies. In the physics application of the framework spacetime is the first stable closure that robustly survives iteration. The "currency" of dynamics is not mass or energy but Stability and Fidelity.
Gamma is the regime is the regime where "what survives" becomes objectified through the principle of redundancy. This is similar to what we see happening with pointer states in quantum decoherence, except that VGF decoherence - the stabilisation of closures or attractors in the VGF - can apply to classical phenomena. In the case of biology this is happening in an already quantum decohered classical environment. Essentially, quantum decoherence is treated as a specific case of VGF decoherence. In the framework all evolution from quantum to biological is evolution by VGF decoherence.
RNA World
In VGF terms, the RNA world is an early regime in which chemical possibility begins to discover repeatable attractors before there is yet the fully stabilised γ-closure of modern cellular heredity.
In terms of the VGF framework pre-RNA chemistry is α-proximal β
Before replication, there are many possible molecular combinations. Most do not persist. The VGF here is highly open: many transient proto-closures, weak attractors, little durable memory.
RNA replication: the first strong hereditary attractor
RNA is special because, in the RNA-world hypothesis, it can both store sequence information and perform catalytic work. That means a molecule can begin to participate in its own recurrence: not merely existing, but helping similar forms exist again. Standard accounts describe RNA as plausibly preceding DNA because it could combine genetic and catalytic roles before DNA and proteins separated those functions.
In VGF language, RNA replication is where iteration becomes heredity.
A self-copying RNA system is an attractor because it biases the chemical field toward recurrence of its own pattern. Once copying exists, the field is no longer just chemistry; it is chemistry with memory.
Mutation and selection: attractor competition
RNA copying is imperfect. That imperfection is crucial. Too much fidelity would freeze the system; too little fidelity would dissolve it. So the RNA world sits directly inside the Stability–Fidelity problem:
RNA must be stable enough to recur, but unstable enough to vary.
This gives us a field of competing attractors: some RNA sequences copy better, some catalyse better, some survive degradation better, some cooperate better. The “what survives” principle begins to operate as a genuine evolutionary filter.
Proto-cells: enclosure as attractor amplification
When RNA systems become associated with lipid vesicles or other compartments, the attractor becomes more γ-like. The system now has an inside/outside distinction. Replication is no longer just molecular recurrence; it is recurrence within a bounded closure.
So the VGF movement is:
α-open chemistry → β molecular recurrence → proto-γ compartmentalised heredity.
RNA → DNA: stability becomes worth more than flexibility
RNA is chemically versatile but relatively fragile. DNA is less catalytically flexible but better suited to long-term information storage. So the transition to DNA is a classic Stability–Fidelity shift: the system sacrifices some immediate functional flexibility for greater hereditary durability.
DNA is therefore a later, more γ-stabilised attractor: a stronger memory structure.
This transition likely involved intermediate RNA–DNA systems, and ribonucleotide reductase-type chemistry later became central because it converts ribonucleotides into deoxyribonucleotides, the building blocks needed for DNA.
Protein enzymes: division of labour
Once proteins take over most catalytic functions, RNA no longer has to do everything. DNA becomes the stable archive, proteins become the active machinery, and RNA becomes a mediator between them.
In VGF terms, the original RNA attractor differentiates into a more robust triadic closure:
DNA = stabilised memory
RNA = transitional interpreter
protein = active catalytic machinery
That is a major γ-closure: heredity, translation, metabolism, and cellular reproduction becoming mutually reinforcing.
So, The RNA world is the phase in which the VGF first discovers replicative molecular memory; the transition to DNA is the later stabilisation of that memory into a more durable hereditary attractor, while catalytic flexibility is displaced into proteins.
Or more compactly:
RNA is β learning to repeat itself; DNA is γ learning to preserve what β has discovered.
The RNA → DNA transition is almost a miniature model of the whole IIP–VGF logic.
The starting point is not “life” as an already-given object. It is iterative generativity: molecular processes keep recurring, combining, failing, reappearing, and occasionally finding forms that can repeat themselves more effectively than surrounding alternatives.
At first, the distinctions are fragile. A particular RNA-like sequence, fold, catalytic loop, or copying relation is not yet a stable “thing” in the strong sense. It is a β-discovery: a distinction in the field that begins to matter because it can recur. But it remains vulnerable to breakdown, copying error, chemical instability, environmental disturbance, and competition from other forms.
So the VGF movement looks like this:
infinite iteration → recurring distinctions → attractors → closures → stable worlds
In the RNA world, a molecular distinction becomes significant when it is no longer merely a one-off chemical event. It begins to pull future events toward itself. A sequence that can assist its own replication is not just present; it has become iteratively privileged. It creates a small basin of recurrence around itself.
That is the birth of an attractor.
But at this stage the attractor is still β-like: active, fragile, transitional, not yet fully objectified. It is more like a tendency than a world. It has some memory, but the memory is unstable. It has some identity, but the identity is error-prone. It has some closure, but the closure is porous and easily lost.
The move toward DNA shows what happens when the field discovers that greater stability can be gained by separating functions. RNA can both store information and act catalytically, but this versatility comes with fragility. DNA, by contrast, gives up some of that immediate chemical versatility in exchange for more stable archival memory. Proteins then take over much of the catalytic work. The system differentiates.
So the early fused attractor:
RNA = memory + activity
becomes the more stable distributed closure:
DNA = memory
RNA = mediation
protein = activity
This is exactly the transition from fragile β-discovery toward γ-objectivity. A distinction first appears as a vulnerable possibility inside the field. Then it becomes reinforced by repetition. Then it becomes divided into mutually supporting sub-functions. Then it becomes embedded in a larger closure, such as the cell. Eventually it becomes so stable and redundant that it forms part of an objective world.
In this sense, the “objective world” is not there because symbolic intelligence names it later, although symbolic intelligence certainly objectifies it conceptually. It is there because stable γ-closures have already formed: membranes, genomes, metabolic cycles, replication machinery, cell lineages, ecological relations. These are structures that persist sufficiently, resist perturbation sufficiently, and reproduce sufficiently to become objectively available to later organisms and, eventually, to scientific intelligence.
So the RNA world illustrates the general VGF principle beautifully:
What began as a barely stable molecular possibility becomes part of the durable architecture of life.
So in VGF terms we could say:
The VGF is the field in which infinite iteration discovers differences that can survive themselves.
And:
Objectivity is what happens when a discovered distinction becomes so redundantly stabilised that it no longer appears as a fragile event, but as a world-structure.
In this way, the RNA → DNA transition is not just an episode in early biology. It is a clear example of the deeper morphology of the framework: β discovers; γ preserves; and the VGF evolves by converting fragile recurrence into objective closure.
In the IIP-VGF framework we model any structure or dynamic in nature in terms of the VGF, which is the vast generative field of closures or attractors that arises from the principle of infinite iteration or self-recurrence. This is the VGF attractor landscape. The "starting point" is literally the infinite iteration principle itself (IIP) which is simply the abstract principle of infinite self-recurrence. Within the approach, in principle modern mathematics itself is already downstream of the "starting point" (the IIP) and consists of structures and relations that have already stabilised within the VGF. Modern mathematics can then be used post hoc to examine the VGF.
The alpha - beta - gamma formation central to the framework derives from the quadratic tensor recursor that generalises the structure of infinite self-recurrence.
Alpha is the regime of the self-recurrence or iteration itself.
Beta is the regime of proto closures and closures in the iteration or self-recurrence. These are already subject to the evolutionary principle of "what survives" in the attractor landscape, long before what we would ordinarily recognise as objects and structures of the kind that empirical science studies. In the physics application of the framework spacetime is the first stable closure that robustly survives iteration. The "currency" of dynamics is not mass or energy but Stability and Fidelity.
Gamma is the regime is the regime where "what survives" becomes objectified through the principle of redundancy. This is similar to what we see happening with pointer states in quantum decoherence, except that VGF decoherence - the stabilisation of closures or attractors in the VGF - can apply to classical phenomena. In the case of biology this is happening in an already quantum decohered classical environment. Essentially, quantum decoherence is treated as a specific case of VGF decoherence. In the framework all evolution from quantum to biological is evolution by VGF decoherence.
RNA World
In VGF terms, the RNA world is an early regime in which chemical possibility begins to discover repeatable attractors before there is yet the fully stabilised γ-closure of modern cellular heredity.
In terms of the VGF framework pre-RNA chemistry is α-proximal β
Before replication, there are many possible molecular combinations. Most do not persist. The VGF here is highly open: many transient proto-closures, weak attractors, little durable memory.
RNA replication: the first strong hereditary attractor
RNA is special because, in the RNA-world hypothesis, it can both store sequence information and perform catalytic work. That means a molecule can begin to participate in its own recurrence: not merely existing, but helping similar forms exist again. Standard accounts describe RNA as plausibly preceding DNA because it could combine genetic and catalytic roles before DNA and proteins separated those functions.
In VGF language, RNA replication is where iteration becomes heredity.
A self-copying RNA system is an attractor because it biases the chemical field toward recurrence of its own pattern. Once copying exists, the field is no longer just chemistry; it is chemistry with memory.
Mutation and selection: attractor competition
RNA copying is imperfect. That imperfection is crucial. Too much fidelity would freeze the system; too little fidelity would dissolve it. So the RNA world sits directly inside the Stability–Fidelity problem:
RNA must be stable enough to recur, but unstable enough to vary.
This gives us a field of competing attractors: some RNA sequences copy better, some catalyse better, some survive degradation better, some cooperate better. The “what survives” principle begins to operate as a genuine evolutionary filter.
Proto-cells: enclosure as attractor amplification
When RNA systems become associated with lipid vesicles or other compartments, the attractor becomes more γ-like. The system now has an inside/outside distinction. Replication is no longer just molecular recurrence; it is recurrence within a bounded closure.
So the VGF movement is:
α-open chemistry → β molecular recurrence → proto-γ compartmentalised heredity.
RNA → DNA: stability becomes worth more than flexibility
RNA is chemically versatile but relatively fragile. DNA is less catalytically flexible but better suited to long-term information storage. So the transition to DNA is a classic Stability–Fidelity shift: the system sacrifices some immediate functional flexibility for greater hereditary durability.
DNA is therefore a later, more γ-stabilised attractor: a stronger memory structure.
This transition likely involved intermediate RNA–DNA systems, and ribonucleotide reductase-type chemistry later became central because it converts ribonucleotides into deoxyribonucleotides, the building blocks needed for DNA.
Protein enzymes: division of labour
Once proteins take over most catalytic functions, RNA no longer has to do everything. DNA becomes the stable archive, proteins become the active machinery, and RNA becomes a mediator between them.
In VGF terms, the original RNA attractor differentiates into a more robust triadic closure:
DNA = stabilised memory
RNA = transitional interpreter
protein = active catalytic machinery
That is a major γ-closure: heredity, translation, metabolism, and cellular reproduction becoming mutually reinforcing.
So, The RNA world is the phase in which the VGF first discovers replicative molecular memory; the transition to DNA is the later stabilisation of that memory into a more durable hereditary attractor, while catalytic flexibility is displaced into proteins.
Or more compactly:
RNA is β learning to repeat itself; DNA is γ learning to preserve what β has discovered.
The RNA → DNA transition is almost a miniature model of the whole IIP–VGF logic.
The starting point is not “life” as an already-given object. It is iterative generativity: molecular processes keep recurring, combining, failing, reappearing, and occasionally finding forms that can repeat themselves more effectively than surrounding alternatives.
At first, the distinctions are fragile. A particular RNA-like sequence, fold, catalytic loop, or copying relation is not yet a stable “thing” in the strong sense. It is a β-discovery: a distinction in the field that begins to matter because it can recur. But it remains vulnerable to breakdown, copying error, chemical instability, environmental disturbance, and competition from other forms.
So the VGF movement looks like this:
infinite iteration → recurring distinctions → attractors → closures → stable worlds
In the RNA world, a molecular distinction becomes significant when it is no longer merely a one-off chemical event. It begins to pull future events toward itself. A sequence that can assist its own replication is not just present; it has become iteratively privileged. It creates a small basin of recurrence around itself.
That is the birth of an attractor.
But at this stage the attractor is still β-like: active, fragile, transitional, not yet fully objectified. It is more like a tendency than a world. It has some memory, but the memory is unstable. It has some identity, but the identity is error-prone. It has some closure, but the closure is porous and easily lost.
The move toward DNA shows what happens when the field discovers that greater stability can be gained by separating functions. RNA can both store information and act catalytically, but this versatility comes with fragility. DNA, by contrast, gives up some of that immediate chemical versatility in exchange for more stable archival memory. Proteins then take over much of the catalytic work. The system differentiates.
So the early fused attractor:
RNA = memory + activity
becomes the more stable distributed closure:
DNA = memory
RNA = mediation
protein = activity
This is exactly the transition from fragile β-discovery toward γ-objectivity. A distinction first appears as a vulnerable possibility inside the field. Then it becomes reinforced by repetition. Then it becomes divided into mutually supporting sub-functions. Then it becomes embedded in a larger closure, such as the cell. Eventually it becomes so stable and redundant that it forms part of an objective world.
In this sense, the “objective world” is not there because symbolic intelligence names it later, although symbolic intelligence certainly objectifies it conceptually. It is there because stable γ-closures have already formed: membranes, genomes, metabolic cycles, replication machinery, cell lineages, ecological relations. These are structures that persist sufficiently, resist perturbation sufficiently, and reproduce sufficiently to become objectively available to later organisms and, eventually, to scientific intelligence.
So the RNA world illustrates the general VGF principle beautifully:
- A fragile distinction appears in β.
- Iteration tests it.
- Attraction reinforces it.
- Closure protects it.
- Redundancy stabilises it.
- Division of labour deepens it.
- Memory preserves it.
- And eventually a world appears.
What began as a barely stable molecular possibility becomes part of the durable architecture of life.
So in VGF terms we could say:
The VGF is the field in which infinite iteration discovers differences that can survive themselves.
And:
Objectivity is what happens when a discovered distinction becomes so redundantly stabilised that it no longer appears as a fragile event, but as a world-structure.
In this way, the RNA → DNA transition is not just an episode in early biology. It is a clear example of the deeper morphology of the framework: β discovers; γ preserves; and the VGF evolves by converting fragile recurrence into objective closure.