Bond Sign Management as Universal Homeostatic Control -

ABSTRACTThe Bonding Principle established in Smith (2026c) proposes that the universe is atotality of bonding relationships and that bond sign — whether a relationship expands orcontracts possibility space for its participants — is a functional category, not a moralone. This paper formalises the mathematics of bond sign management: themechanisms by which coherent systems maintain, restore, and optimise the sign of theirbonding relationships to sustain homeostasis. Three mathematical objects areintroduced and developed: the bond sign function s(B_ij, t) taking values in {-1, 0, +1};the basin coherence metric C(Ω) as the normalised weighted sum of bond signcontributions across a system; and the shade function…