Not decay. A sequence of gates.
At gap 0, dense-minus-surface order memory is essentially absent. At 16 it is clean and inward. By 32 the later response has inverted. At 64 the whole-future trace is surface-biased. At 128 the immediate inward response is clean again.
0.5→4 · release +32
0.5→4 · release +32
0.5→4 · release +32
0.5→4 · release +32
0.5→4 · release +32
A fixed, non-selected visual sequence from source 01 under 0.5→4 native cancel-first. It illustrates the evolving bodies; the memory estimates use all 16 organisms, both causal orders, orthogonal controls, and the complete factorial subtraction.
The trace needs unforced time to form.
The whole-future depth effect at zero delay is -0.078. After sixteen unforced steps it is +3.258. The paired increase is +3.336 [+1.918, +4.738]—positive in every family group.
Immediate test
The second perturbation arrives before the first regime has been embodied as a depth-specific susceptibility.
16-step release
Without further intervention, the order history becomes more causally legible.
Memory here is not leftover force. It is something the organism builds during unforced evolution.
It changes sign, layer, and post-test timing.
Between 16 and 32 steps, the later depth response shifts by -7.375 [-12.078, -2.852]. At 64, the surface component alone is cleanly positive: +0.922.
16 steps
The equal-dose order trace is expressed inward.
32–64 steps
The later response flips, then the whole trace moves toward the surface.
128 steps
Immediate dense-core memory returns at +4.24 [+1.14, +7.27].
A plausible picture is phase memory: the first information regime shifts an internal developmental trajectory, and the second perturbation meets different susceptibility windows as that trajectory evolves.
After 128 steps, the inward trace is stronger than at zero.
Gap 128 minus gap 0 immediate depth memory is +3.547 [+0.516, +7.203]. A simple material scar should be strongest immediately and then weaken. This result does the opposite.
“Causal echo” is the right working phrase: past intervention becomes readable again after a long unforced interval. Five points do not prove a period—but they clearly reject monotone decay.
Watch the hidden clock continuously.
The next experiment removes the second perturbation entirely. After a 0.5×, 4×, or sham prime, we record the unforced body densely through 192 steps and measure every density shell, radius, mass, and connectivity transition.
State tomography
Find which physical coordinate cycles with the 16, 32, 64, and 128-step susceptibility windows.
Prediction
Use the pre-test state—not elapsed time—to predict whether the next response will land at the surface or core.
Intervention
If one coordinate predicts the echo, perturb that coordinate directly and move the susceptibility window.
We may be looking at an internal causal clock: not a timer encoded in one scalar, but a recurrent route through the body’s density geometry that changes what future information can do.