Natural Organization and Constancy Field: A General Theory of Identifiable Forms, Their Structure, Identification, Relationships, and Evolution across All Relational-Hierarchical Scales within the Continuous and Coherent Organization of Reality

Abstract Natural reality exhibits a persistent coexistence of stability and transformation. Across organizational levels and Relational-Hierarchical Scales, identifiable forms emerge, persist, interact, transform, and reorganize while remaining embedded within broader relational-hierarchical contexts. Although individual disciplines investigate particular domains and processes, understanding how organizational continuity and transformation are interconnected throughout reality requires a domain-general, all-level, and all-scale theoretical explanation. The General Theory developed in this paper is centered on Natural Organization, Relational Hierarchies (RH), Relational-Hierarchical Systems (RHSs), Constancy, Invariance under Variation (IuV) Structures, Organizational Cores, Overall Identity, Principal Identities, the Constancy Structure Principle (CSP), and the Constancy Field (CF). It addresses the structure, identification, organization, relationships, and evolution of identifiable forms throughout Reality, at every organizational level and across all Relational-Hierarchical Scales. The theory begins from the recognition that reality is organized through recursively interconnected relational-hierarchical arrangements rather than as a collection of isolated entities. These arrangements connect identifiable forms across organizational levels and scales while preserving their differentiated organizational characteristics. Natural Organization denotes the continuing organization of Reality through the persistence, interaction, transformation, and emergence of differentiated identifiable forms. The identifiable organized forms within specified organizational scopes are formulated as RHSs. Constancy refers to the persistence of an RHS's identifiability under relevant variation, and IuV Structures express the structural basis of this persistence. Each RHS has one and only one overall Organizational Core associated with its Constancy. Its Overall Identity corresponds to its overall IuV, while its differentiated Principal Identities correspond to characteristic subsets of its overall IuV system. The CSP specifies the relationships among the overall Organizational Core, the overall and subordinate IuVs, and the identity structures of the focal RHS. The CF is introduced as the conditionally activated universal-historical field of IuV Structures, characterized by RH organization and functioning as the Reality-Level Evolutionary Field. The theory further examines how identifiable RHSs participate in broader relational-hierarchical organization through Same-Kind RHS Populations, Cross-Kind Clusters (CKCs), Environmental Conditioning, and the Focal Relational-Hierarchical Network (Focal RHN). CF--RH Conditional Coupling, the overall Reality-Level evolutionary mechanism within the Reality Evolutionary Architecture (REA), connects the universal-historical organization represented by the CF with the current and recursively developing organization of RH. Every local change alters the CF, while the participation of historical conditions and particular changes in subsequent evolutionary organization remains conditional. Within REA, the focal evolutionary structure is organized around a Central Axis comprising the Evolutionary Subject and its conditional coupling with its outside world through Engagement or Non-Engagement responses to an Initiating Variation; the Conditionally Activated Co-Evolving Process (CACP); Realizations and Conditional Manifestations; Accumulation; and Differentiated Evolutionary Tendencies (DETs). The Evolutionary Subject's Engagement with an Initiating Variation may satisfy the relevant focal conditional-coupling conditions and enable CACP activation, whereas Non-Engagement does not satisfy that condition for activation through the particular variation. CACP involves conditionally activated interactions and co-evolving processes among the Evolutionary Subject and relevant participants. These processes may generate Realizations and Conditional Manifestations, which may undergo condition-dependent Accumulation and contribute to differentiated evolutionary tendencies. The DETs give rise to two principal evolutionary pathways: the Persistence Path and the Transformation Path. The Persistence Path addresses continued identifiability through Stability, Sub-RHS Exchange, and Recursive Continuity. The Transformation Path addresses identity-relevant transformation and the emergence of new RHSs and/or Principal Identities, with Recursive Continuity as a contingent possibility. Their integration with the Central Axis produces three complete evolutionary configurations: the Persistence Closed Loop, the Transformation Closed Loop, and the Transformation Open Loop. The Organizational Variation Episode (OVE) characterizes a bounded operational episode completed through one of these configurations. Natural Organization serves as the Completion Indicator of REA, expressing the continuing organization of Reality represented by its integrated evolutionary architecture. The General Theory is a domain-general, all-level, and all-scale theory of identifiable forms throughout Reality. With REA as its integrative evolutionary architecture, it connects the identification and persistence of RHSs with their internal organization, external relations, broader relational-hierarchical contexts, and differentiated evolutionary trajectories. It examines how identifiable forms respond to variations arising within their organization or through their outside world, how their interactions produce organizational consequences, and how persistence, transformation, and emergence occur across organizational levels and Relational-Hierarchical Scales without assuming that identical mechanisms operate in every domain. Through this integration, the General Theory establishes an Integrative Understanding of Reality as an integrated yet differentiated, relational-hierarchically organized, and continuously evolving whole. It provides a common theoretical basis for examining organizational continuity and transformation across diverse domains of natural reality, connecting differentiated areas of knowledge, and advancing the further integration of human understanding.