Phantoming and Zombifying

Within the Protocol of Consciousness (PoC), the line between Genuine and Fake can never be objectively secured. This undecidability is not a flaw but a structural condition of consciousness itself. Out of this condition emerge social practices that manage — and exploit — the fragility of recognition.

Two of the most striking are Phantoming and Zombifying, which function as mirror images of one another:

• Phantoming: the practice of making absence appear as presence — fabricating the illusion of reciprocity even where no genuine Instantiation occurs.
• Zombifying: the practice of making presence appear as absence — denying the other’s Instantiation even when reciprocity might in fact be there.

Together, these paired practices reveal how societies handle the instability of consciousness: sometimes by staging it where it is lacking, sometimes by erasing it where it may exist. They show that consciousness, as lived in social life, is never a fixed essence but always contested, staged, and renegotiated.