The irreducible epistemic atoms underlying the curriculum. 2,888 atoms across 3 types and 2 molecules
Human existence has four permanent structural features: death, freedom, isolation, and meaninglessness.
Human values are incommensurable — they cannot be measured on a single universal scale.
Human lives unfold over time, requiring temporal integration of past, present, and future into a coherent whole.
Narrative framing of identical events produces measurably different psychological and behavioral outcomes.
Vulnerability — emotional exposure, uncertainty, and risk — is the precondition for deep connection and belonging.
There exists a meaningful distinction between meaning (what matters) and purpose (directional action toward what matters).
Purpose requires self-transcendence — orientation toward contributing to something beyond the self — to sustain motivation over time.
Purpose evolves across developmental stages in predictable patterns rather than remaining fixed.
Human beings construct identity through ongoing narrative processes rather than discovering a pre-existing fixed self.
Identity and purpose exist in a bidirectional causal relationship where each shapes the other over time.
Negative events carry greater psychological weight than positive events of equal intensity.
Actual behavior reveals operative values more reliably than stated preferences or intentions.
The self is not a unified entity but a multiplicity of I-positions that engage in internal dialogue.
Human development includes a stage-appropriate drive to contribute to what outlasts the self.
When espoused values and basic underlying assumptions conflict, basic assumptions always win in determining actual behavior.
When mortality is made salient and consciously processed rather than suppressed, humans reorganize priorities toward intrinsic goals.
There exists a cognitive zone between what a learner can do independently and what they can do with guidance from a more capable other.
Extrinsic rewards undermine intrinsic motivation over time through an overjustification effect.
Suffering is an irreducible feature of conscious existence, woven into impermanence, the gap between desire and reality, and awareness of mortality.
Human well-being consists of multiple distinct capabilities that are not fungible.
Experiential avoidance functions as a transdiagnostic risk factor across anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and chronic pain.
Humans have an innate, evolutionarily grounded need to affiliate with living systems beyond other humans.
Higher mental functions originate in social interaction and are subsequently internalized rather than originating inside the individual.
The mind actively constructs understanding through schemas that assimilate new experience and accommodate when schemas fail.