The Speed of Light as the Limit of World-Connectivity - Simulation, Time, and Ontological Irreversibility

In physics, the speed of light is regarded as the upper limit of signal transmission and as a fundamental constant of spacetime. This description is empirically correct and formally sufficient. The present text argues, however, that the speed of light also possesses an ontological significance that has so far remained largely unthematized.Starting from an ontology of irreversible world-binding, it is shown that the speed of light does not merely limit how fast information can be transmitted, but marks what can become world-connectable at all. Everything that can be transmitted necessarily appears as the trace of a world-enactment that has already occurred. Presence itself is in principle not…