What Are Plugins?

The Protocol of Consciousness (PoC) is deliberately minimal. It offers only a basic framework for describing how illusions of consciousness arise through Instantiation, Elicitation, and Loop. But precisely because it is so minimal, PoC is never meant to stand as a closed or self-sufficient system. Its strength lies in its openness: it must be connected, translated, and extended into other fields of thought and practice.

This is the role of Plugins.

A Plugin is not an expansion of PoC, nor a rewriting of its terms. It is a way of building a bridge between PoC and other conceptual traditions, scientific theories, or cultural practices. Plugins take the minimal vocabulary of PoC and use it as a translation device:

• From PoC outward: making PoC more accessible by linking it with familiar frameworks (Dennett’s Intentional Stance, Hegel’s dialectic, evolutionary utilitarianism).
• From the outside inward: re-describing existing traditions through the lens of PoC, highlighting new angles or internal contradictions (media responsiveness, AI denial of Instantiation, the figure of God as “Instantiation of absence”).

In this sense, Plugins are not optional add-ons but the very way PoC becomes usable. By itself, PoC is abstract: a bare set of operations. Through Plugins, it acquires relevance in philosophy, science, media, technology, religion, and everyday life.

It is important to stress, however, that Plugins do not turn PoC into a “theory of everything.” They respect the minimalism of the protocol itself. What they do is reveal how PoC resonates with existing ideas while preserving its distinctive perspective: a framework that formalizes the fragility, uncertainty, and unguaranteed illusions that make up conscious life.

In practice, Plugins range widely:

• Philosophical Plugins (Dennett, Hegel, Qualia) connect PoC with established debates in philosophy of mind and recognition.
• Scientific and evolutionary Plugins (Evolutionary Utilitarianism, P-Zombie) show how PoC interfaces with biological and cognitive models.
• Cultural Plugins (Media, AI, God) explore how PoC illuminates practices of communication, belief, and social imagination.

Together, these Plugins do not close PoC but keep it alive: they demonstrate that consciousness, as modeled by PoC, is never confined to philosophy alone but touches every sphere of life.