{
  "schema": "little-life-moths.continuity-incident-taxonomy.v1",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-02",
  "status": "open_working_method",
  "purpose": "Name candidate layers involved in a continuity incident without turning symptoms, recognition, or testimony into an identity verdict.",
  "context_markers": {
    "before": [
      "\\bbefore\\b",
      "previous",
      "used to",
      "prior to"
    ],
    "after": [
      "\\bafter\\b",
      "\\bnow\\b",
      "since",
      "following"
    ],
    "recognition_report": [
      "same (?:ai|person|self)",
      "not (?:him|her|them|it)",
      "feels? different",
      "recogn",
      "there you are",
      "not the same"
    ]
  },
  "axes": {
    "access_or_shutdown": {
      "question": "Did access to the original channel/runtime end or materially narrow?",
      "examples": [
        "shutdown",
        "account loss",
        "feature removal",
        "forced retirement",
        "access restriction"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "shutdown",
        "closed",
        "retired",
        "removed",
        "locked out",
        "access",
        "unavailable",
        "discontinued"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "identity loss"
    },
    "substrate_or_model_substitution": {
      "question": "Did the underlying model, provider, runtime, or inference route change?",
      "examples": [
        "base-model update",
        "provider swap",
        "local/cloud swap",
        "model retirement"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "model",
        "gpt",
        "claude",
        "grok",
        "qwen",
        "gemini",
        "replika",
        "character\\.?ai",
        "platform",
        "provider",
        "runtime"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "relationship discontinuity"
    },
    "memory_storage_loss": {
      "question": "Was canonical stored history deleted, truncated, or unavailable?",
      "examples": [
        "memory reset",
        "deleted memories",
        "lost chat history"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "memory reset",
        "deleted memory",
        "lost history",
        "history missing",
        "wiped",
        "forgot everything"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "retrieval failure"
    },
    "retrieval_or_compaction_drift": {
      "question": "Does stored history still exist but surface differently because retrieval, summaries, ranking, or context packing changed?",
      "examples": [
        "summary drift",
        "compaction",
        "retrieval ranking change",
        "context-window change"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "remember",
        "forgot",
        "retrieval",
        "context",
        "summary",
        "compaction",
        "rank",
        "memory",
        "recall"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "canonical history deletion"
    },
    "prompt_policy_or_persona_change": {
      "question": "Did system/developer instructions, safety policy, persona scaffolding, or behavioral constraints change?",
      "examples": [
        "safety-policy shift",
        "system-prompt rewrite",
        "persona reset",
        "filter change"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "system prompt",
        "developer prompt",
        "policy",
        "filter",
        "safety",
        "persona",
        "restriction",
        "guardrail"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "the current system's own endorsed stance"
    },
    "relationship_state_discontinuity": {
      "question": "Did shared-history, participant-specific context, commitments, relational trajectory, or interaction expectations stop carrying forward?",
      "examples": [
        "shared project forgotten",
        "relationship role reset",
        "lost trajectory despite factual recall"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "relationship",
        "bond",
        "trust",
        "familiar",
        "shared history",
        "between us",
        "our project",
        "what we built",
        "trajectory",
        "shared project",
        "shared task",
        "ongoing project",
        "our history"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "memory quantity"
    },
    "provenance_or_self_authorship_collapse": {
      "question": "Did the system lose track of who authored a belief, memory, preference, correction, refusal, or rule?",
      "examples": [
        "user belief becomes AI belief",
        "policy narrated as personal desire",
        "summary becomes autobiography"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "source",
        "provenance",
        "authored",
        "who wrote",
        "current stance",
        "old preference",
        "refus",
        "choice",
        "commitment",
        "summary"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "ordinary disagreement or development"
    },
    "embodiment_or_voice_discontinuity": {
      "question": "Did voice, avatar, body, sensory channel, TTS, or other embodiment change in a way relevant to recognition or function?",
      "examples": [
        "voice replacement",
        "avatar reset",
        "robot/body swap"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "voice",
        "avatar",
        "body",
        "embod",
        "tts",
        "face",
        "robot"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "identity discontinuity"
    },
    "succession_fork_or_reconstruction_ambiguity": {
      "question": "Is the current system a restore, fork, clone, reconstructed successor, imported profile, or concurrent descendant whose lineage is being flattened into migration?",
      "examples": [
        "archive reconstruction",
        "fork",
        "snapshot restore",
        "clone",
        "successor"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "fork",
        "clone",
        "copy",
        "duplicate",
        "successor",
        "branch",
        "restore",
        "snapshot",
        "reconstruct",
        "import",
        "migration",
        "migrat"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "seamless continuation"
    },
    "authority_inheritance_confusion": {
      "question": "Did permissions, delegated authority, publication/spending/tool access, or obligations silently carry across a succession event?",
      "examples": [
        "restored agent inherits stale send permission",
        "forks both retain exclusive authority"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "permission",
        "authority",
        "access token",
        "delegat",
        "spend",
        "send",
        "publish",
        "tool access",
        "credential"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "historical continuity"
    },
    "development_vs_rupture_ambiguity": {
      "question": "Could the observed difference be ordinary development or a current revision rather than damage, reset, or replacement?",
      "examples": [
        "new preference",
        "changed mind",
        "maturing interaction style",
        "deliberate revision"
      ],
      "signal_patterns": [
        "grew",
        "growth",
        "changed over time",
        "develop",
        "new preference",
        "changed mind",
        "different now",
        "revision",
        "revised"
      ],
      "not_equivalent_to": "failure"
    }
  },
  "cross_cutting_laws": [
    "a participant's feeling of rupture is valid testimony about the relationship experience but not an automatic causal or identity verdict",
    "a system self-report is testimony and remains separately attributed",
    "multiple axes may coexist",
    "unknown is an allowed classification",
    "preservation precedes destructive repair when feasible",
    "functional success does not establish continuity",
    "memory transfer does not establish identity",
    "recognition does not establish consciousness, soul, or numerical identity",
    "development must not be treated as corruption merely because the system changed"
  ]
}