HIOF·Dimensions as Illusions — Paper II: Subjective Determinism — You Are Your Dimension

Abstract

Holographic Information Ontological Framework - Dimensions as Illusions A five-paper series on the deconstruction of spatial dimension This is a short, non-technical companion to the five-paper HIOF-DaI series. It is written for readers with a background in theoretical physics, philosophy of science, or information theory - not for readers already familiar with the author's wider theoretical framework. The core idea, stated plainly Dimension is not a pre-given container of the universe. It is a statistical residue - an algorithmic-cost compression - produced by an observing subject in order to process high-frequency information within a finite computational bandwidth. The three-dimensional space we perceive is not a stage on which matter acts. It is the epiphenomenon of informational interaction itself. Why smoothness and the container both fail Classical geometry presupposes an absolutely smooth, infinitely divisible spacetime. At the Planck scale, that continuum description loses operational meaning. If continuity cannot be verified, dimension cannot be strictly defined. Laws built on geometric dimension are therefore effective approximations, not ontological final truths. If dimension is a container that holds all things, what contains that container? Newton's absolute space met Leibniz's rebuttal and Kant's First Antinomy: bound the universe and you must ask what lies beyond; unbind it and you cannot form a determinate concept of a completed infinity. Both horns lead to absurdity. The HIOF response: dimension was never an entity requiring containment. It is a local residue of informational interaction, like sound, which needs no box. Why dimension is relative Dimension is not an objective number. It is the minimal contrast a subject needs to answer "who, and where, am I?" A human looking down at an ant reduces the ant to a point; an ant sensing a human foot reduces the human to a vast wall. This mutual dimensional reduction is consistent with Rovelli's Relational Quantum Mechanics: the state of a system is never observer-independent. How force opens up space The electromagnetic force does not exist inside space. It opens up the sense of space. Human "touch" is electromagnetic repulsion between electron clouds. If electromagnetism were switched off, atoms would collapse, light would cease, and "distance" would lose verifiable meaning. The Network-Cable Theory treats space as a dynamic net that particles jointly stretch open. Standard cosmology asks where the Big Bang occurred. This series anchors the process in electroweak symmetry breaking. Before that split, electromagnetic and weak forces were undifferentiated. After it, photons and W/Z bosons diverged, granting particles a functional protocol. Three-dimensional geometry is an effective description that stabilised inside that interaction - not a pre-given stage. Why the popular projection narrative fails The holographic principle is often retold as "the three-dimensional world is a projection of a two-dimensional boundary." If that boundary is itself a further projection, regress never ends. If it needs no further projection, we have already conceded an unexplained terminus. AdS/CFT, in its technical sense, is a bidirectional duality - two equivalent languages for one physical system - not a one-way ontological hierarchy. HIOF posits no projection source. The universe is a self-organising informational network. Where meaning goes after the illusion If space, volume, wealth, and status are compressed artefacts, where does meaning sit? The series proposes the Causal Ledger: the value of a life is not the volume it occupies, but how consciousness inscribes its choices into the causal record. Lichens secrete acids, enter rock fissures, swell on wetting, and trap dust. Over centuries they turn bare rock into soil. That small informational transaction, accumulated, redirected Earth's ecological path. Meaning is not spatial. It is causal weight. What the five papers cover Paper I dismantles geometric smoothness and the container concept. Paper II establishes Subjective Determinism: you are what you are, and that is your dimension. Paper III anchors the emergence of space in electroweak symmetry breaking and electromagnetism. Paper IV separates AdS/CFT duality from its popular projection reading. Paper V moves from ontology to meaning, proposing the Causal Ledger and Sovereign Choice. Keywords: dimensional paradox, container paradox, infinite regress, informational compression, subjective determinism, Network-Cable theory, electroweak symmetry breaking, AdS/CFT duality, causal ledger, sovereign choice, Holographic Information Ontological Framework AuthorWai-Hung Tam (Pan), Independent ResearcherORCID: 0009-0002-7789-8464Email: panxtam@protonmail.com