PhronesisEnvy — the aversive state arising from awareness of another's advantage — bifurcates at a critical appraisal point into two distinct wrong attractor basins that require separate displacement-framework analysis. Malicious envy (W_ME) is the contrast-oriented variant: the appraisal that the other's advantage is undeserved and cannot be assimilated generates hostility, zero-sum thinking, and schadenfreude.
Benign envy (W_BE) is the assimilation-oriented variant: the appraisal that the other's advantage is deserved and potentially reachable generates motivating desire — but when chronically sustained becomes grinding inadequacy rather than productive inspiration. The healthy ground state S^0 is defined as inspired agency: using the observed success of others as motivational signal for one's own growth without chronic comparison loops or hostile derogation.
Using van de Ven et al.'s empirical framework recast in displacement terms, nine formal propositions characterize the bifurcation point as a landscape saddle, the malicious basin W_ME including zero-sum worldview and schadenfreude neuroscience, the benign basin W_BE as a chronic comparison loop, basin-deepening factors including narcissistic vulnerability and low self-efficacy, and return paths through attribution work, self-compassion, growth mindset, and agency activation.