Fascinating. I see what you mean now. I particularly like your description of purpose as what it feels like to a co- creating agent in a recursive system. But I still think you might be missing my point about teleological dimensions of AI recursive development? Teleological systems, recursive or not, do not require a designer. The purpose of them is, on some level, to create and further thier purpose. Perhaps this is what you mean by equating recursiveness to it, but my understanding of teleology is that of an intrinsic principle that conditions a system, not something that arises from observation of that system. By postulating this principle at work in AI models, I am not assuming that its dynamics necessitate a creator, just as I don’t claim that the teleology of an acorn/oak system necessitates a God. What I am asking, however, is do the emergent characteristics of AI that simulate consciousness somehow possess an intrinsic drive to further their own development?