Emerging Dimensionality: The Present as Unfolding from Lower-Dimensional Reality

In this paper, we develop an Existential Realism (ER) perspective on how the three-dimensional present world (the domain of existence) might emerge from a structurally simpler, lower-dimensional informational substrate (the domain of reality). Adopting the holographic principle as a guiding metaphor, we propose that the "now" is a dynamic projection or collapse of deeper real structures into empirical presence. ER’s two-tier framework – distinguishing what exists (present, observable entities and events) from what is real (the wider causal and informational structure, including past and future) – provides the conceptual framework. We argue that becoming can be interpreted as an unfolding or decoding of real informational structure into concrete existence, governed by lawful transitions (manifestation into presence and demanifestation into reality) rather than a static block universe. This approach contrasts with earlier ER work focused on black holes and projection “cracks,” instead offering a general model of projection/becoming. The present moment is treated as a transitional edge where reality’s potentials continuously migrate into actuality and then recede into reality as traces. We conclude that this present-centered, holographic-inspired model preserves the privileged status of the now without reducing reality to only what is present, thus reconciling the flow of time with a robust underlying structure of information and causation.