Dissolving the Binding Problem: Unity as Foundational in Experiential Empiricism

The binding problem has long puzzled neuroscientists and philosophers of mind: how do disparate perceptual features such as color, shape, and motion integrate into a single coherent experience? This paper demonstrates that the problem arises solely from assuming a mind-independent material substrate where separate neural processes require mysterious unification mechanisms. Applying Experiential Empiricism (EE), which treats experience as the foundational domain without unprovable external assumptions, the binding problem dissolves. Unity is not constructed from isolated components but intrinsic to experiential patterns themselves. Neural correlates become mappings of these patterns rather than causal origins needing integration. This dissolution preserves neuroscience's predictive power while eliminating conceptual artifacts, paralleling EE's resolution of the hard problem of consciousness and quantum measurement paradoxes. The analysis reinforces EE's subtractive methodology, showing that many "hard problems" stem from unwarranted externalist commitments.