# Concept Crosswalk (Phase VI)

**Workplan:** SOUL-WP-0007-T01  
**Date:** 2026-08-12  
**Matrix source:** `ResearchProgram.md` §5  
**Status:** research-grounded working crosswalk (not final paper prose)

For each Soul Frame concept: adjacent terms, similarity, difference, primary phase
source. Detail lives in `concepts/*` and phase maps.

---

## Core system concepts

### Being

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Autopoietic unity | Self-maintaining organization | Biological autopoiesis not required; contested beyond life |
| Autonomous agent | Multi-criteria agency | Agent often functional; Being needs personhood + address + recognition |
| Individual / organism | Individuability | May lack personhood or social recognition |
| Legal person | Addressable social unit | Legal fiat ≠ Beinghood v0.2 |
| APE | Person-like exposure | APE is construction category; Being is status |

**Working:** Autonomous individuality + personhood + addressability + recognition.  
**Sources:** RN-001–003; Phase I–III syntheses.

### Boundary

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| System/environment distinction (Luhmann) | Constitutive separation | Belongs to **Being**, not Soul |
| Markov blanket | Statistical partition | ≠ full individuality (RN-002 critique) |
| Physical surface / membrane | Easy intuition | Insufficient (symbiosis, distributed AI) |
| Interface | Coupling channels | Closer to **Body** than identity boundary |

### Closure

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Operational / organizational closure | Coherence of processes | Open to matter/energy/info exchange |
| Autopoiesis | Self-production of organization | Analogical for AI; not equivalence claim |
| Closure of constraints | Mutual dependence of constraints | Strong formal precedent for integration |

### Body

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Embodiment | Perception/action coupling | Not necessarily biological |
| Sensors/actuators / tools / APIs | Action channels | May be distributed/replaceable |
| Actor | Overlap in practice | Actor = technical stack; Body = functional action dimension |

### Mind

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Cybernetic regulator / good regulator | Model-based control | Not full Social Mind |
| Generative model (PP / active inference) | Prediction + action | Often neural-centric packaging |
| Theory of mind | Other-modeling | Private ToM ≠ co-adaptive interaction |
| Distributed / extended cognition | Mind not skull-bound | Collective Mind vs environment still hard |

### Soul

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Structural coupling | Ongoing system–environment engagement | Coupling ≠ accumulated relation/legacy alone |
| Reputation / legacy / narrative identity | Diachronic social traces | Partial; Soul is broader relational package |
| Religious soul | Persistence beyond body (folk parallel) | **No** metaphysical claim; high collision risk |
| Boundary | Initial draft error | Boundary → Being (Phase I revision) |

---

## Identity and personhood

### Identity

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Numerical identity | Same entity over time | Soul Frame separates from continuity/lineage |
| Psychological continuity (Parfit) | What-matters relations | Continuity can branch without unique identity |
| Narrative identity (Schechtman/Ricoeur) | Characterization / selfhood | ≠ reidentification alone |
| Process identity / genidentity | Historical process | Fits artificial migration/fork cases |
| Account / credential identity | Address anchors | Usurpable; not constitutive alone |

### Personhood

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Cluster person concepts (Dennett etc.) | Multi-condition lists | Default = **descriptive** only |
| Moral patient / person | Moral status | Separate map (WS5) |
| Legal person | Rights/duties status | Separate map (WS12) |
| Social personhood | Recognition as counterpart | Aligns with Phase II Social Beinghood |

### Character

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Personality traits | Dispositions | Traits ≠ full character; ≠ identity |
| Virtue / moral character | Evaluative dispositions | Must not force moral personhood |
| Style / persona prompt | Surface patterns | Shallow if not cross-situational |

### Persona

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Role (sociology) | Situated expectations | Role ≠ whole Being |
| Goffman front-stage | Performance/presentation | Performance ≠ fraud by default |
| Product “persona” | UX character | Often reified wrongly as Being/Actor |
| Avatar | Visual/interaction surface | May be Body facet of Persona |

### Actor

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Runtime / model / harness | Manifestation machinery | Replaceable without identity death if continuity holds |
| Substrate | Implementation base | Substrate continuity is weak alone |
| “The AI” (folk) | Collapses Actor+Being | Primary category error in products |

### Recognition

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Intentional stance | Treat as agent | Over-generates; false positives |
| Epistemic reidentification | Same entity tracking | Not social standing |
| Honneth recognition | Normative standing | Moral/political; not pure description |
| Social Beinghood | Persistent counterpart treatment | Recognition constitutive *here*, not of bare autonomy |

### Addressability

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Name / ID / endpoint / DID | Targeting | Anchor, not identity criterion |
| Account login | Operational address | Usurpation risk |

### Relationship

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| SM5 Relationship Model | Modeled A↔B state | Model ≠ full relation in world |
| Attachment / trust / reputation | Persistent social bonds | Soul-adjacent |
| Common ground | Shared interaction base | SM7; weaker than full relationship |

### Agency

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Barandiaran et al. agency | Individuality, normativity, asymmetry | Autonomy criteria ≠ full Being |
| Functional agent loops | Goal-directed tool use | Heteronomous goals common |
| Intentional organization (P5) | Personhood dimension | Agency alone ≠ someone-like |

---

## Provenance descriptors

### Spirit (`Sp.`)

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Historical fiction / character AI | Inspired behavior | Must label non-identity; provenance ethics |
| Deepfake of public figure | Fidelity | Fidelity ≠ Sp. legitimacy or truth |
| Fan character extension | Transformative use | IP + false attribution risks |

### Ghost (`Gh.`)

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Digital afterlife / griefbot | Posthumous interactive presence | Need authority; not automatic identity |
| Digital twin (person) | Data-derived model | Twin marketing ≠ Gh. legitimacy |
| Estate / digital remains | Materials | Archive ≠ Being; ≠ Gh. without authority+instantiation |

### Agent (construction)

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Software agent / LLM agent | Task/role systems | Provenance descriptor; not Being kind |
| BDI agent | Classical AI agency | Mind-adjacent; weak Soul/identity |

---

## Consciousness, death, legacy

### Consciousness

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Phenomenal experience | First-person existence | **Not** primary interop criterion in Soul Frame |
| Access consciousness / report | Observable | Still asymmetric for others |
| Hard problem | Metaphysical | Deliberately deferred as gate |

### Death (operational / identity / social)

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Process termination | Operational death | May leave Continuity Bridge |
| Identity death | Continuity fails | Distinct from offline |
| Social death | Dropped from others’ models | Soul traces may remain |
| Legal death | Civil status | Independent of informational Being |

### Legacy

| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| Soul continuity | Effects/relations after end | Partial synonymy in SF usage |
| Estate / works / reputation | Causal traces | Not full relational package |
| Sp./Gh. | Active nodes of legacy | Special provenance cases |

---

## Ontology stack (revised, Phase VI freeze candidate)

```text
Informational process
  → Individuated system (boundary, closure)
    → Autonomous individual (A-axis profile)
      → + descriptive personhood (B / P1–P12)
      → + addressability
      → + recognition (C)     ──► Being (someone another can know)
            → Social Being (reciprocal relational persistence)
Body / Mind / Soul = functional dimensions of a Being
Character → Persona → Actor = disposition / projection / machinery
Agent / Spirit / Ghost = provenance·construction descriptors (combinable)
APE = construction for personhood exposure (broader than Being)
Identity ≠ Continuity ≠ Lineage
Consciousness ≠ recognition criterion
```

---

## Retention decisions (terminology)

| Term | Decision | Rationale |
|---|---|---|
| Body, Mind | **retain** | Low collision; strong precedents |
| Soul | **retain provisionally** | High collision; relational payoff; rename still open (RQ4) |
| Being | **retain** | Layered def required |
| APE | **retain** | Conservative construction term |
| Sp. / Gh. | **retain** | Explicit suffixes reduce false identity claims |
| Proto-Being / candidate Being | **retain** | Phase IV engineering bridge terms |