Contact Electrification as a Non-Markovian Kinetic Trap: An Effective Open-System Letter from MetaTime v36.1

This preprint proposes an effective open-system theory of contact electrification in which the triboelectric effect is modeled as a non-Markovian kinetic trap rather than as an instantaneous charge-transfer process. The framework introduces an internal latent state with finite relaxation time, allowing residual surface charge to emerge from causal memory, incomplete interfacial equilibration, and dissipative constraints during separation. The manuscript develops a minimal phenomenological model, derives scaling laws for residual charge in terms of a tribological Deborah number, and formulates explicit experimental signatures including velocity-dependent charge retention, hysteresis, waiting-time memory, and a Landauer-type lower bound for interfacial erasure costs. This work is presented as a conservative, referee-oriented effective theory intended to test whether a finite memory timescale is required to explain static electricity in open tribological systems.