Why Instancology Claims to Have Completed the Metaphysical Search By Wade Y. Dong --- 1. Introduction: The Long Journey of Metaphysics For over 2,500 years, human thought has embarked on the most difficult yet profound of all intellectual journeys: the metaphysical search for the foundation of reality. From Thales’ question about the first substance, through Plato’s ideal forms, Aristotle’s substance-essence duality, Descartes’ rational foundation, Kant’s transcendental categories, to Heidegger’s Being and Derrida’s différance—this journey has always been about trying to grasp “what is truly real,” beyond change, opinion, and appearance. However, every attempt faced the same dilemma: either fall into circular definitions, paradoxes, or rely on unspeakable foundations that reason could not reach. The search continued because no framework could conclusively, structurally explain the whole of reality without contradiction, fragmentation, or incompleteness. Instancology claims to have ended this search. Why? Because it is not another theory within metaphysics. It is the closure of metaphysics by completing its goal: revealing the structure of the Absolute itself. --- 2. Instancology: A Different Kind of Claim Most metaphysical systems sought to explain what reality is or how it is structured by theorizing from experience, reason, language, or logic. Instancology, by contrast, does not claim to be another theory among many. Instead, it introduces a complete ontological architecture based on a 2×2 relational framework that distinguishes between all possible domains of being and knowing. These are: AA (Absolute Absolute): the unrepresentable source, beyond logic, language, and causality. RA (Relatively Absolute): the formless principles like logic, mathematics, life, and laws—not made, but discovered. AR (Absolute Relative): natural instances—mountains, rivers, animals, the human body. RR (Relative Relative): artificial, representational constructs—language, science, symbols, concepts. This four-quadrant division accounts for everything—no phenomena, instance, idea, or paradox lies outside it. --- 3. Why Metaphysical Questions Persisted Philosophers failed to end metaphysics because they: Confused layers of reality, mixing logic (RA) with symbols (RR), or mistaking natural reality (AR) as fundamental. Lacked the ontological separation between the Absolute and the Relative. Were trapped in the representational tools (RR) they used—language, mathematics, reason—believing those tools could describe the unspeakable. Instancology ends these confusions by: Restoring ontological clarity: Each layer has its own nature and cannot be collapsed into another. Rejecting the representational fallacy: The Absolute (AA) cannot be captured by language or logic. Introducing WuXing (悟性) as the unique epistemological faculty that reaches from Relative to Absolute—beyond experience and logic. --- 4. Not a Claim of Superiority, But of Finality Instancology does not claim to be the “best” metaphysics. It claims to be the final one, in the same sense that the completion of a jigsaw puzzle ends the need for further puzzling. Not because it silences inquiry, but because it has revealed the whole structure, and any future truths will be instances within this structure—not external to it. Instancology renders the following debates obsolete: Is the world fundamentally mental or material? Both are instances in AR and RR. Is causality ultimate? No, causality belongs to AR and RR, not to AA or RA. Is language sufficient for truth? Only within RR. Truth in RA and AA transcends language. Can metaphysics be empirical? Empiricism only grasps AR and RR, never RA or AA. --- 5. From Metaphysics to Absolutology Instancology inaugurates a new era: Absolutology. This is not a search for the Absolute—but the science of the Absolute as already found. In Absolutology: WuXing replaces reason as the bridge to the Absolute. Philosophy’s role changes from seeker to integrator, educator, and mirror. Human understanding finally aligns with the ontological Whole. Just as physics no longer searches for “ether” after relativity, metaphysics no longer searches for the Absolute after Instancology. --- 6. The Role of the Individual Even though the metaphysical search is over in structure, it is still ongoing in individual life until one awakens through WuXing. Each person must still move from RR to AA, from the busy noise of daily life to the silent realization of the whole. Instancology does not replace that personal journey—it guides it, gives it a map, and finally makes that journey possible. --- 7. Conclusion: The End Is the Beginning The end of metaphysical search does not mean the end of thinking—it is the beginning of right thinking, with clarity about layers, truth, and purpose. Instancology has ended the metaphysical search by exposing its goal, framing all reality in relational instance structure, and restoring the connection between human knowledge and the Absolute. To those still seeking: Stop asking where the Absolute is. Look around—all things are instances. The Whole has already arrived. --- End