Persistence Theory and the Brain: A Thermodynamic Framework for Neural Coherence, Epilepsy Intervention, Conscious Communication, and Sensory Restoration

Neural computation occurs under thermodynamic constraints. The brain’s ability to preserve information, maintain structure, and resist degradation in the face of entropy is a hallmark of its resilience — and possibly its consciousness. Persistence Theory provides a unifying formalism to model this resilience using entropy-sensitive variables to describe when and why certain structures — such as grid cells, place cells, memories, or cognitive intentions — persist or collapse.This perspective outlines the relevance of Persistence Theory to neuroscience, beginning with the spatial code in the hippocampus, where persistence underpins the stability of cognitive maps through grid and place cell dynamics. It then expands into speculative but actionable frontiers, including brain-computer interfaces for locked-in patients, where intention and communication may be decoded not from movement, but from persistent internal representations. Similarly, the theory points to novel strategies for sensory restoration in blindness, where spatial structure could be re-established through non-visual inputs that evoke high-persistence activation patterns — allowing the brain to "see" without relying on photoreceptor input.Critically, this framework may also transform how we understand and manage epilepsy. Rather than viewing seizures solely as aberrant discharges, Persistence Theory models them as catastrophic collapses of reversibility — phase transitions where local entropy and excitatory overload destabilize otherwise coherent systems. By identifying early markers of persistence erosion, it may be possible to predict, prevent, and even therapeutically reverse the drift toward seizure states, offering a thermodynamically grounded approach to neurostabilization.Across these domains — spatial cognition, communication, sensory substitution, and clinical neurology — reversibility, as formalized by the core variable eta, may emerge as the central design constraint for next-generation neural technologies. Whether in decoding thought, preventing collapse, or restoring function, persistence is not just a property of healthy systems — it may be the key to making the brain readable, repairable, and consciously knowable from within.