Dynamic Systems, Process Metaphysics, and Hyperneuroplasticity

Stability Through Flux

Enjoy this and other posts by Dr. Patty Gently, @thegentleheretic on The Bright Insight Blog!

Introduction: Beyond Static Models of Mind and Body

When we talk about brain and body function, medical and psychological discourse has often emphasized linear, static, and mechanistic models: trauma causes PTSD, vascular block causes stroke, neurotransmitter imbalance causes depression. While useful in certain clinical contexts, these models obscure the reality that living systems are not machines with parts that break down in predictable ways. They are dynamic, temporally constituted processes, continuously maintaining stability while their components are in constant flux.

In a previous essay, I explored epigenetics as one dimension of this dynamism, demonstrating how chromatin modifications, DNA methylation, and non-coding RNAs enable stable gene expression patterns while responding to environmental pressures (Steffen & Ringrose, 2014). Epigenetic regulation exemplifies how systems can be mutable yet coherent. The same theme of a continuously negotiated process emerges across neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy, reinforcing the reality that stability is not an endpoint.

This post develops that theme by drawing together three strands: Khandker’s process metaphysics, dynamic systems theory, and the framework of hyperneuroplasticity. Together, these approaches consider how systems persist through instability and how identity, cognition, and biology are fundamentally shaped by temporality, permeability, and reconfiguration.

Wahida Khandker: Process Metaphysics and Mutative Life

Philosopher Wahida Khandker situates life within the lineage of process metaphysics, extending the work of Alfred North Whitehead and Henri Bergson. For Khandker (2020), organisms are considered ongoing processes rather than static “things." Identity emerges, therefore, from the unfolding of temporally situated events. And so, according to Khandker, rather than resisting change, the coherence of living systems is held by actively incorporating it into new forms of stability.

In Process Metaphysics and Mutative Life: Sketches of Lived Time, Khandker emphasizes that organisms must be understood as processes rather than objects, and that identity is not essence; it's becoming. They insist that lived time is constitutive of life itself, shaping the ways organisms experience, adapt, and persist. And they underscore that part-whole relationships are ecological and dynamic, meaning that systems exist within systems, maintaining balance and interdependence rather than isolation. These philosophical insights resonate with biology, where organisms maintain stability through homeostasis, plasticity, and ecological attunement. In rejecting the objectification of life, Khandker aligns with contemporary science that increasingly sees systems as adaptive and nonlinear (Noble, 2012).

Dynamic Systems Theory, Where Stability is in Constant Flux

Dynamic systems theory (DST) provides the scientific and mathematical scaffolding for understanding the paradox that Khandker identifies: how systems can be stable while undergoing constant change. It is an interdisciplinary framework used in physics, biology, psychology, and neuroscience to describe how complex systems evolve over time according to principles of interaction, regulation, and feedback. Within this approach, a dynamic system is defined less by its individual components and more by the rules of interaction that govern how it evolves. In light of this, it becomes easier to see how key concepts function as bridges between abstract mathematics and lived biological reality.

DST is built upon several foundational elements that help explain patterns of order, change, and persistence across complex systems. The key ideas of attractors, bifurcations, and feedback loops provide the language for describing how stability is maintained or disrupted. Attractors are the patterns or states toward which systems tend to gravitate, returning again and again despite perturbations. Bifurcations are the thresholds where small changes bring about disproportionate shifts, pushing systems into new regimes of order or disorder. Feedback loops describe the cycles that can sustain stability when they enable self-regulation, or contribute to instability when they spiral out of balance.

These elements are not separate or isolated. Together they form a network of ideas that shows how systems maintain coherence while also allowing for transformation. Linking them in sequence highlights that dynamic systems theory offers technical vocabulary and a narrative for understanding the continual negotiation of order and change. One concrete illustration is infant brain development. Neural circuits initially display multiple possible trajectories, while over time attractors stabilize certain pathways. When new learning or stress reaches a threshold, bifurcations can shift the brain into a new organizational regime. Feedback loops then reinforce or destabilize these patterns depending on how the system regulates itself. This illustrates how DST, which is often associated with mathematics, applies to lived biology. This principle is further supported by physicist Kim Sneppen (2014), who emphasized that biological systems sustain coherence and ‘remember’ past states through regulatory interactions and dynamic feedback, rather than static configurations, underscoring that coherence is achieved through flux rather than permanence.

Hyperneuroplasticity: A Systemic Profile of Mutability

I use hyperneuroplasticity (HNP) to describe an unusually high capacity for rapid, deep, whole-system neural reconfiguration. Unlike the conventional notion of neuroplasticity that highlights recovery from injury or learning-based change, HNP reflects a trait-like systemic orientation toward adaptation. It represents a pervasive sensitivity and mutability that shape cognition, emotion, and physiology in profound ways.

An HNP profile is therefore characterized by heightened responsiveness to stimuli, environments, and experiences. Sensory, emotional, and cognitive signals penetrate quickly and deeply, producing both accelerated learning and intense overwhelm. It is also defined by the permeability of systemic boundaries, where interactions between the brain, immune system, connective tissue, and gut-brain axis are more pronounced. Finally, it is marked by adaptability across domains: individuals with HNP often display accelerated creativity, rapid acquisition of knowledge, and fluidity of identity that reflects ongoing reconfiguration.

HNP does not imply pathology though it intersects with conditions such as MCAS, EDS, dysautonomia, and FND that are often viewed through the medical model (Rowe et al., 1999; Castori, 2012). These conditions are better understood not as dysfunctions alone but as expressions of systemic mutability, meaning the tendency of whole biological and psychological systems to adapt, reorganize, and transform in response to internal and external pressures while still maintaining coherence. Where traditional research on neuroplasticity emphasizes isolated instances of change, HNP emphasizes plasticity as a pervasive orientation of the entire system.

Translation Glossary: Process and Hyperneuroplasticity

Khandker’s vocabulary of process metaphysics can be fruitfully translated into the language of hyperneuroplasticity. Their concept of mutative life resonates with the idea of systemic hyper-adaptability, where organisms are defined by their capacity to reorganize in response to context. Their emphasis on lived time parallels the developmental tempo of HNP systems, which often move through accelerated cycles of growth and change. The claim that organisms are processes aligns with the description of nervous systems as dynamic plastic networks. Their view of pathology as variability speaks to the double edge of HNP where heightened sensitivity can manifest as creativity or as vulnerability. And their concern for ecological balance maps onto the multi-system integration that defines HNP, where the nervous, immune, endocrine, and connective tissue systems operate as an interdependent whole.

By further exploring these vocabularies, we see that what philosophy articulates ontologically, hyperneuroplasticity describes biologically. Both reject static models and emphasize the fundamentally processual, temporal, and systemic nature of identity.

Epigenetics Revisited as a Bridge Between Biology and Metaphysics

In my earlier blog on epigenetics, I emphasized how chemical modifications to DNA and histones provide a mechanism for stable memory through flux. Genes are expressed differently depending on context, yet the organism sustains coherence through regulatory processes (Bird, 2007). This molecular reality mirrors Khandker’s philosophical insight: identity emerges through stability-in-change.

By understanding this emergent process, the parallels come further into focus. Epigenetics illustrates how coherence at the cellular level is achieved through regulatory processes that are themselves mutable. Process metaphysics explains this at the level of being, while hyperneuroplasticity captures it in the lived experience of certain neurobiological profiles. Whether at the scale of molecules, neural networks, or whole organisms, stability arises by transforming with change rather than resisting it.

Gifted/Galvanic Types, ADHD, and Autism as Expressions of Hyperneuroplasticity

Gifted neurodivergence, or what I have elsewhere called the galvanic type, can be understood as one important expression of hyperneuroplasticity, and it is closely related to other neurodivergent profiles such as ADHD and autism. These ways of being are often described in terms of accelerated intellect, exceptional focus, or atypical social and sensory styles, and they are frequently misinterpreted as pathology or excess. From the perspective of hyperneuroplasticity and process philosophy, however, they are better seen as manifestations of systemic mutability.

Galvanic-HNP individuals are often adept at rapid pattern-finding and meaning-making. Their capacity to connect across domains enables them to synthesize knowledge and insight at a pace that may take others far longer to achieve (Gently, 2024). Similarly, many autistic and ADHD individuals display this dynamic but in unique ways: monotropic focus or divergent ideation can both be understood as expressions of hyper-responsive neural systems. Emotional, imaginational, intellectual, sensory, and psychomotor intensity is another common thread. The permeability that defines HNP means that experiences penetrate deeply, producing both overwhelm and profound transformation. This intensity can manifest in sensory sensitivities or in the drive and restlessness often reported by neurodivergent individuals, reflecting mutative potential.

Identity fluidity is also a shared theme. Because their systems are oriented toward ongoing reconfiguration, gifted and neurodivergent individuals may cycle through careers, creative expressions, and worldviews with unusual speed, reshaping themselves repeatedly. Though often judged as instability, this fluidity is a sign of temporal acceleration, a developmental tempo that amplifies both possibility and precarity. From the perspective of process philosophy, these traits across Galvanic types, ADHD, and autism are not deficits but evidence of life’s capacity for accelerated becoming. Dabrowski (1964) spoke of dynamisms such as the drive to transcend one’s type, a profound inner psychic transformation that signals movement into higher levels of development. This involves reconfiguring values, identity, and meaning-making structures in ways that cannot be reduced to external adaptation. It is an inward crossing of thresholds that reflects authentic growth. Khandker’s framework validates this as lived time intensified, where heightened mutability defines not disorder but one of the most profound expressions of systemic creativity.

Trauma as Forced Reconfiguration

Trauma, too, can be reframed through the lens of hyperneuroplasticity and process metaphysics. Rather than treating it solely as damage, trauma may be seen as a disruption of systemic coherence that encourages reconfiguration of systems that are already oriented toward mutability.

At the neurobiological level, trauma imprints itself through epigenetic and neural changes that reorganize perception, memory, and affect regulation (Yehuda & Lehrner, 2018). Dynamic systems theory helps explain how trauma can “lock” a system into maladaptive attractor states, where defensive patterns become self-sustaining. Those who experience profound difficulty and trauma often describe altered perceptions of time, consistent with process accounts that regard lived temporality as fundamental to identity. Trauma fragments time, creating discontinuities in experience that mirror the disruption of coherence at the systemic level.

For individuals with HNP, the double edge of mutability becomes stark. Heightened plasticity enables rapid adaptation, yet it also increases vulnerability to being reshaped by overwhelming events. Healing, then, cannot be understood as a return to a prior baseline. It involves renegotiating coherence, finding new ways of integrating mutative potential into sustainable forms of being. In this sense, trauma recovery is not about restoration but about the creation of new forms of order within ongoing flux (van der Kolk, 2014).

Toward an Integrated Framework of Life as Mutability

When we integrate these models of understanding, a unified framework emerges. Dynamic systems theory explains how stability arises through flux. Process metaphysics explains what it means for identity and being. Hyperneuroplasticity explains who embodies this mutability in distinct neurobiological profiles. Epigenetics grounds it all at the molecular level.

Taken together, these approaches support a view of human life as nonlinear, permeable, temporal, and creative. Development is not a straight line. Boundaries are porous and mutable. Identity is constituted in time. Variability is generative rather than deficient. This integrated framework allows us to understand life as an ongoing negotiation of coherence through change, rather than a more vague essence.

Khandker reminds us that life is not a static noun. Life is a verb in motion. Dynamic systems theory seems to confirm this scientifically, while hyperneuroplasticity embodies it biologically. Epigenetics adds molecular precision to the same insight: coherence arises not from stasis but from transformation. For those who live with the intensity of HNP, this framing provides more than explanation. An understanding of HNP offers a language of belonging rather than the othering maintained by pathology: mutability is one of life’s most profound and organic expressions of creativity.

References

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Dabrowski, K. (1964). Positive disintegration. Little, Brown and Company.

Gently, P. (2024). Intersection of intensity: Exploring giftedness and trauma. Gifted Unlimited.

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Khandker, W. (2020). Process metaphysics and mutative life: Sketches of lived time. Palgrave Macmillan.

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van der Kolk, B. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking.

Yehuda, R., & Lehrner, A. (2018). Intergenerational transmission of trauma effects: Putative role of epigenetic mechanisms. World Psychiatry, 17(3), 243–257. https://doi.org/10.1002/wps.20568