Coverage Crystallization and Structural Contradiction: A Naturalized Reconstruction of the Genesis of Dialectical Contradiction

Dialectical logic has long faced a foundational difficulty: how to provide a non-circular, empirically inspectable account of the genesis of dialectical contradiction--one that does not presuppose the very universality it seeks to explain. This paper proposes Coverage Crystallization--the compression-locking of high-dimensional possibility spaces into low-dimensional causal shortcuts--as a mechanism that generates structural contradiction endogenously. For any finite system operating under open, non-trivial tasks, the process of achieving structured effectiveness through Coverage Crystallization necessarily produces an uncovered structural remainder (caomang). The relation between the crystallized domain and this remainder satisfies four conditions--exclusivity, codetermination, feedback potential, and transformability--that together constitute a structural contradiction distinct from propositional . We distinguish latent contradictions (boundary-only) from strong contradictions (with actual feedback pressure) and reconstructive contradictions (triggering structural update). The -- framework (representation dimensionality ratio, causal utility, openness) defines a structure-active interval that provides normative criteria for distinguishing healthy from pathological contradiction. We systematically compare this framework with the Free-Energy Principle (Friston), bounded rationality (Simon), computational levels (Marr), and causal hierarchy (Pearl), and discuss its implications for understanding Kuhn-style paradigm shifts, reconstruction failure, and the naturalized boundary of dialectical critique.Dialectical logic has long faced a foundational difficulty: how to provide a non-circular, empirically inspectable account of the genesis of dialectical contradiction--one that does not presuppose the very universality it seeks to explain. This paper proposes Coverage Crystallization--the compression-locking of high-dimensional possibility spaces into low-dimensional causal shortcuts--as a mechanism that generates structural contradiction endogenously. For any finite system operating under open, non-trivial tasks, the process of achieving structured effectiveness through Coverage Crystallization necessarily produces an uncovered structural remainder (caomang). The relation between the crystallized domain and this remainder satisfies four conditions--exclusivity, codetermination, feedback potential, and transformability--that together constitute a structural contradiction distinct from propositional . We distinguish latent contradictions (boundary-only) from strong contradictions (with actual feedback pressure) and reconstructive contradictions (triggering structural update). The -- framework (representation dimensionality ratio, causal utility, openness) defines a structure-active interval that provides normative criteria for distinguishing healthy from pathological contradiction. We systematically compare this framework with the Free-Energy Principle (Friston), bounded rationality (Simon), computational levels (Marr), and causal hierarchy (Pearl), and discuss its implications for understanding Kuhn-style paradigm shifts, reconstruction failure, and the naturalized boundary of dialectical critique.