The Ontological Architecture of the Law of Continuity of Being: A Reflexive Ontological Framework for Universalizable Ethics

This paper presents the ontological architecture of the Law of Continuity of Being (LCS), a systematic philosophical framework that derives a universalizable ethics from four apodeictic ontological principles (P1–P4) together with two explicit, non-apodictic Bridge Principles. We demonstrate that from P1 (I am, existential certainty) follow necessarily P2 (invariance of being), P3 (ontological dependence on the Greater Whole), and P4 (reflexive recognition). From P1–P4, together with the Strong Bridge Principle of Ontological Symmetry (BP-S), we derive the Ontological Categorical Imperative (OCI): preserve and expand the continuity of conscious being. A second, weaker principle (BP-W) extends moral considerability to sentient non-reflexive beings without assimilating them to full moral agency. This architecture engages classical problems in ethics — Hume's is-ought problem, Kant's formal emptiness, and the challenge of moral relativism — not by claiming to dissolve them through ontology alone, but by making explicit the normative bridge required to move from reflexive ontological recognition to universalizable obligation. We provide proofs of internal coherence under this conditional architecture, examine its applicability across cultural, species, and hypothetical artificial contexts, and derive practical implications across several domains (war, justice, ecology, artificial intelligence, bioethics). The LCS is offered as a systematic ontological grounding for ethics whose central claims remain defensible even where its broader metaphysical commitments are contested, and whose normative bridges are presented transparently as conditions of consistency for the reflexive agent, rather than as apodictic deductions from being alone. Keywords: ontology, ethics, consciousness, categorical imperative, continuity of being, bridge principles, universalizable morality, artificial intelligence ethics, bioethics Version 2.0 substantially revises the architecture of v1.0. The central thesis changes from an apodictic derivation (P1–P4 ⇒ OCI, via an "Identity Thesis" equating being and obligation) to a conditional architecture (P1–P4 ∧ BP-S ⇒ OCI), mediated by two explicit, non-apodictic Bridge Principles (BP-S, BP-W) and a supplementary third (BP-P, Appendix A.5). Substantive changes:— Hume's is-ought problem, Kant's formal emptiness, and moral relativism are now engaged as conditionally mediated rather than resolved or refuted.— New: explicit treatment of the reference-class problem (§7.2), acknowledged as an unresolved difficulty shared with every universalization-based ethics since Kant.— New: Prudential-Volitional Bridge (BP-P) and extended treatment of the free-rider problem, including an explicit terminal limit (Appendix A.5).— New: engagement with Buddhist anatta as the hardest case for trans-cultural validity (§9.1), left honestly unresolved.— New: §11.1, "The Specific Contribution of the LCS," auditing and declining an earlier, stronger originality claim against Korsgaard's Self-Constitution (2009).— Revised: P2 split into P2_physical / P2_personal, with personal continuity left explicitly open (previously implied by the invariance principle).— Revised: AI applicability reframed from a categorical absence of P1 to structural (not merely temporary) epistemic indeterminacy. This version does not correct errors in v1.0; it reflects a deliberate shift in the paper's epistemic standard, from claiming to have closed the is-ought gap to making explicit, and delimiting honestly, the conditions under which it can be bridged.