KFD Formal Model

KFD Formal Model

This document defines the shared notation and authority boundary for the non-normative formal references published with KFD-1 through KFD-13.

• Status: experimental
• Normative: no
• Formal model version: 1
• Authority: decisions/KFD-N.md

Foundation explanation · Documentation map

Purpose

The formal layer makes KFD concepts precise enough to compare, implement, and test without pretending that every semantic responsibility can be reduced to an algorithm. It defines domain objects, relations, invariants, state transitions, invalid states, and proof obligations.

The numbered decision remains authoritative:

Decision -> Formal -> Schema -> Usage -> Witness

• Decision states what must remain true.
• Formal gives a precise, non-normative reference semantics.
• Schema makes a bounded machine profile checkable.
• Usage explains how a product or repository applies the profile.
• Witness records evidence for a concrete claim.

If any later surface conflicts with its decision, the later surface is wrong. A valid schema may implement only part of a formal model. A valid witness may prove only the claim and audit boundary it declares.

Shared notation

For a KFD number n:

D_n       authoritative decision
F_n^v     formal reference at formal model version v
S_n^i     machine schema profile at interface version i
U_n       implementation guidance
W_n       evidence witness

Models(x, y) means that x is a declared projection of y. It does not mean that x exhausts the meaning of y.

Models(F_n^v, D_n)
Models(S_n^i, F_n^v)
Models(U_n, D_n and selected F_n^v/S_n^i)
Models(W_n, a bounded adopter claim)

The required authority invariant is:

not Contradicts(F_n^v, D_n)
not Contradicts(S_n^i, D_n)
not Contradicts(U_n, D_n)

Machine validation can prove structural closure, registered identities, digests, enumerated values, and some transition rules. It cannot by itself prove that natural-language meaning, captured reality, causal interpretation, participant value, or a Primitive claim is correct.

Shared objects

The formal references reuse these object classes:

The same concrete artifact may play more than one role. Role identity must be declared rather than inferred from file type or product vocabulary.

Cross-KFD composition

The twelve references compose as follows:

KFD-1 maintains a non-drifting fact base.
KFD-2 bounds trust claims to that fact base.
KFD-3 makes trusted value available for cooperation.
KFD-4 preserves and transforms declared perspectives.
KFD-5 separates candidate genesis from qualification.
KFD-6 repeats bounded discovery over causal experience without self-certification.
KFD-7 distinguishes the Fact-Episode Ontology from Action Responsibility Geometry: Facts
preserve admitted state, Episodes preserve realized causal occurrence, and
Pursuit, Atlas, and Warrant keep direction, perspective, and authority
independently addressable in real-world action.
KFD-8 specifies Atlas as the perspective coordinate.
KFD-9 specifies Pursuit as the continuing-direction coordinate.
KFD-10 specifies Warrant as the bounded-authority coordinate.
KFD-11 separates Claim, purpose-bound Assessment, Warrant-bound Decision, and
independently recorded Admission.
KFD-12 applies those boundaries and action coordinates to an
Initiative-Assignment software-work responsibility lifecycle.
KFD-13 applies them to one software-project settlement procedure.

This composition does not make every later KFD a theorem of the earlier ones. It states dependency: a later procedure cannot claim KFD conformance while bypassing the earlier fact, trust, cooperation, or perspective boundaries it uses.

Action extension

KFD-7 extends the shared model by treating Fact cuts as object-like admitted states and Episodes as morphism-like, evidence-bearing causal paths. Together they form the Fact-Episode Ontology. Atlas, Pursuit, and Warrant are the reference action coordinates in the Action Responsibility Geometry for perspective, direction, and admissible action. They are not Domain Profiles. KFD-8 through KFD-10 separately allocate their draft responsibilities. KFD-11 adds a cross-domain settlement procedure rather than another action coordinate. KFD-12 and KFD-13 remain software-domain applications rather than universal additions to the geometry.

This active decision remains intentionally falsifiable. Activation does not prove that the proposed roles are universally minimal or establish a literal physical geometry. Its source-candidate lineage remains at drafts/action-state-separation.md.

Formal reference contract

Every per-KFD formal page must expose:

1. authority and status;
2. imported vocabulary;
3. domain objects;
4. relations and predicates;
5. invariants;
6. state transitions where applicable;
7. proof obligations;
8. invalid states and counterexamples;
9. machine mappings;
10. non-claims and extension points.

Each formal statement must remain traceable:

An absent schema mapping is allowed and must be explicit. Inventing a machine proof where only semantic review exists is not allowed.

Versioning

formal model version is independent of package semver and schema interface versions. Compatible clarification may retain the current formal version. A change that alters object identity, invariant meaning, transition validity, proof responsibility, or the relation to the authoritative decision requires a new formal model version.

Because the formal layer is non-normative, changing it does not change a KFD by itself. If the required correction changes the decision’s meaning, the decision governance rules in CONTRIBUTING.md apply.

Limits

This model is itself a KFD-4 view: it is a declared engineering projection of the KFD decisions, not reality and not a complete formal ontology of intelligence or life. Its value is falsifiable precision. A definition that cannot survive product evidence, counterexamples, or later causal experience must be corrected rather than defended as final reality.