diff --git a/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/dao-ontology.md b/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/dao-ontology.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1a60baa --- /dev/null +++ b/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/dao-ontology.md @@ -0,0 +1,163 @@ +# Rust to Dust Imperial Ontology: Dao And Path-Fit + +Status: **DRAFT r0.** Companion to [language-design.md](language-design.md). +Nothing here is canon until the operator rules on it. + +## How To Read This + +Claims carry the same tags as `language-design.md`: + +- **[E]** evidence: the source says it. Sources are Meta's words in #weksa on + 2026-11-06 (memories `weksa:memory:mind-20261106T114231978Z-t1-m0`, `-t4-m0`, + `-t7-m0`, and the 12:01Z note on norm-breaking) or a cited file under + `settings/rust-to-dust/`. +- **[I]** invention: this draft proposes it; the operator can overrule it. +- **[E→I]** extension: a source seed this draft develops. + +## 1. The Value System Is Path-Fit, Not Shame And Honour + +[E] The empire's value system centres on one concept that human words only +loosely map. Its working label is **Dao**, a **placeholder** that Meta accepted +until a native name and sound exist. It means living well: roughly +self-actualization. Everyone is given gifts so that they may be used; getting +better at what one does is close to divine; presenting oneself is something +everyone must do. + +[E→I] What follows, and what this ontology therefore does *not* use: + +- **No audience sanction.** The measure is not what others may think (shame, + face, honour as reputation). It is whether the act is true to the actor's own + Dao. A speaker with no audience is still measurable against it. +- **No inner-state guilt.** Failing the Dao is *waste of a gift*, not a feeling. + Stance grades named after human shame, pride or honour are placeholders for + readings this ontology has not defined (see section 5). +- **Duty, not display.** Painting is not vanity; it is the duty of + presenting oneself, a part of using the gift [E]. + +This replaces the shame/honour framing that earlier drafts leaned on +(`language-design.md` section 1, "shameless"; section 4, the *unpainted* split; +and `aliens.md`, "profound shamelessness"). The source file `aliens.md` is the +setting owner's and is not edited here; the tension is listed in section 6. + +## 2. The Path-Fit Test + +[E] Going unpainted is heresy by default (it is not being one's best self), +**unless** it expresses the speaker's own path. Examples from Meta: + +- A warrior who goes into battle unpainted to show martial purity: valid. +- Breaking a norm (unpainted, obscenity) is valid when it emphasises the point + or expresses the speaker's own path. +- A celebrity doing it as a statement: reads as **gauche**, not brave. + +[I] So the ontology needs a test, not a flat rule. A norm-breaking act is read +by **fit between the act and the actor's path**: + +| Input (all typed facts) | Slot it comes from | +|---|---| +| the norm broken (decoration absent, obscenity, ...) | packet predication, or referent decoration state (a gap: `rtd.` extension first, see `language-design.md` section 6) | +| the actor's **path**: field and what the actor's gift and practice are | `Speaker` slot (planned, cut `speaker-scene`) | +| whether the act **serves the actor's own point** (the aim it emphasises) | not a packet fact; read by the ontology from the act and the path, never put in by the client | +| scene: who watches, and whether the act is staged *for* them | `Scene` slot (planned) | + +The output is a **reading**, chosen by the ontology, never sent in a packet: + +| Reading | When [I] | +|---|---| +| **devout** | the norm is kept, the gift is shown | +| **heretical** | the norm is broken and nothing in the actor's path calls for it | +| **path-true** | the norm is broken and the act expresses the actor's own path (the warrior) | +| **gauche** | the norm is broken as a statement the path does not carry; the act borrows the *look* of path-true without the path (the celebrity) | + +[I] Two properties keep this from becoming a status detector: + +1. *Gauche* is a fit failure, not a rank. A high-standing actor can be gauche in + one act and path-true in another. +2. The test is judged against the **actor's** path, not the speaker's. The + commentator infers it from conduct and marks the inference as inferred + (`evidentiality`, `language-design.md` section 3, category 5), because the + performer's sincerity is not telemetry. + +[I] Open: whether the same test governs obscenity and other norm-breaking, or +only the unpainted case. Meta named both as examples [E]; the shared test is +this draft's generalisation. + +## 3. Native Terms: Context-Tagged Readings, Chosen Gloss Recorded Apart + +[E, Meta's Dao De Jing analogy] A native term is not one English equivalent. +Model it as a term with **several readings, each tagged with the context that +selects it**, and record the **gloss chosen for a given lowering separately**, +so the choice can be audited and changed without rewriting the term. + +Two records, held apart [I]: + +**Term** (the imperial ontology's own, language-side): + +- `term`: a native id. Until a name exists it is an opaque placeholder; `Dao` + is the placeholder label for the first term, and is not a spelling. +- `readings`: each is `{ context, sense }`, where `context` is a typed + condition over feature values (speaker path, scene, stance, packet facts) and + `sense` is a short description of the meaning in that context. No reading + names an English word as its meaning. +- Selection among readings is deterministic from `context`; if none matches the + term is left unlowered, not defaulted. + +**Gloss choice** (per lowering, target-side): + +- `{ term, reading, target_language, chosen_gloss, why }`. +- It lives with the lowering that made it, not in the term. Two lowerings of one + term into the same language may choose different glosses, and the term does + not change. + +First term, all readings [I] unless tagged: + +| Term | Reading context | Sense | +|---|---|---| +| `Dao` (placeholder) | general | living well: the full use of one's given gifts; self-actualization [E] | +| `Dao` | the actor's practice improving | getting better at one's work as near-divine [E] | +| `Dao` | presenting oneself | the duty of presenting oneself, painted or path-true bare [E→I] | +| `Dao` | norm broken, path-fit | the actor's own path, as grounds for an exception [E→I] | + +| Gloss choices (illustration only) | | +|---|---| +| `Dao`, general, en-US | "the way", chosen for a reader who knows the analogy; recorded as a choice, not as the meaning [I] | + +[E→I] Why: the analogy Meta drew is the Dao De Jing's many human +translations, each choosing a gloss for one native term. Recording the choice +beside, not inside, the term is what lets that translation test bed (queued, +not started) compare lowerings of one term. + +## 4. What This Gives The Lowerer + +[I] Nothing new in the packet. The reading is selected from `stance`, `Speaker` +and `Scene` features (see `LoweringInput::with_scene` for the scene side) by the +planned `select(profile, stance, speaker, scene)`; the packet carries facts, not +*heretical* or *gauche*. This keeps the lowerer from English-to-alien +substitution: no English word is a key. + +## 5. Placeholders + +[I] These stance-adjacent names are **placeholders** for readings this ontology +has not defined, and must not be read as human shame/honour: + +- `shame` (seed stance feature): in the inventory today as a felt-affect grade. + Whether the empire has a felt affect of this shape, or only the *waste of a + gift* reading above, is open. +- `contempt` and `affection` in the example stance (`panel` pairing, section 3 + of `language-design.md`): human labels for a pairing whose imperial + reading is unsettled. +- "honor" and "vulgar" as used in the existing spec: placeholders for + path-fit success and failure. + +## 6. Open + +- The native name and sound of Dao. +- Whether the unpainted exception reads as sincere or suspect to the commentator + is the question Meta was asked; the answer so far is *path-true* is sincere + and *gauche* is not [E→I], but how a commentator tells them apart from + conduct alone is open. +- `aliens.md` says unpainted is "profound shamelessness" and a rare few go + unpainted "as a controversial artistic claim": the first is the baseline + reading this draft re-frames as heresy against Dao; the second is close to + *path-true*. The setting owner should rule on whether to reword the source. +- Whether *devout/heretical/path-true/gauche* are the right four, or a + continuous fit grade. diff --git a/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/language-design.md b/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/language-design.md index 8e3aa98..66fcb42 100644 --- a/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/language-design.md +++ b/settings/rust-to-dust/imperial/language-design.md @@ -76,8 +76,10 @@ status is two axes, not one. rank in another. - **Standing in the field**, by *claim and demonstrated constraint*, not by force: - 1. **Unclaimed.** No decoration in a field. This is shameless, not neutral - [E: unpainted = shamelessness]. + 1. **Unclaimed.** No decoration in a field. This is not neutral: by default + it is a failure to present oneself, heresy against Dao, unless it is + path-true (see [dao-ontology.md](dao-ontology.md)). [E→I: Meta, + 2026-11-06; the source's "shamelessness" is re-framed] 2. **Claimant.** Decorated, undemonstrated. Tourists live here: the claim is bought and the constraint never chosen [E: tourists buy a safe spectacle]. 3. **Practitioner.** Decorated, with constraint demonstrated in the field. @@ -85,8 +87,8 @@ status is two axes, not one. 5. **Exemplar.** Master whose form others cite. - **Bare-by-claim** is an exceptional state off the ladder, not a step on it. Going unpainted as an artistic claim that the performance alone is art is a - provocation [E]. The grammar must be able to say it without saying - "shameless". + provocation [E]. The grammar must be able to say it as *path-true* + ([dao-ontology.md](dao-ontology.md), section 2), not as a lesser step. The language's address and agreement system tracks **claim versus demonstrated constraint**, because that is what the source treats as the @@ -175,7 +177,8 @@ register words in the source text. ### Why this language is the hard case for restraint [E→I] -For the empire, restraint is not suppression of a shameful interior. It is +For the empire, restraint is not suppression of a shameful interior (no +human shame/honour here: see [dao-ontology.md](dao-ontology.md), section 1). It is **the visible form of chosen constraint**, which is the moral proof of mastery [E]. So the map from `restraint` to surface is *inverted* relative to most human defaults: @@ -183,7 +186,9 @@ most human defaults: - High restraint is the *display* of virtue. A fully restrained speaker with strong felt affect is exhibiting form. - Low restraint with strong affect is not honest. It is *vulgar* [E: "vulgar - violence as failed form"; "collapse into mere function"]. + violence as failed form"; "collapse into mere function"]. "Vulgar" is a + placeholder for a fit failure against the actor's path, not a human taste + judgement. - Zero affect is not neutrality. It can read as an absence of devotion. The deliberate consequence is that stance cannot be flattened to a politeness @@ -266,7 +271,7 @@ select a form from the packet's facts and not from a gloss. | **crude** vs **failed** | crude: sincere, unrefined, with form attempted. failed: form collapsed into mere function. | actor's means and discipline as facts; the stance of the performer is not available, so the ontology reads from conduct | | **resistance** admired and absorbable | resistance read as: threat, folk art, breakout talent (`battle-royale.md` commentary list). Choice depends on whether it centers a performer or a practice. | performer-centered vs distributed agency | | **public spectacle** vs **living practice** [E] | spectacle: meaning lives in a central performer. practice: meaning lives in relationships. The empire reads distributed cooperation as noise or misattributes it to a performer. | number and relation of agents; presence of a focal agent | -| **unpainted**, split | shame / danger / contempt / rawness / refusal / purity (the source lists these senses). Different surface forms: the sense is selected by relation and stance, not by a gloss. | decoration state, scene relation, speaker stance | +| **unpainted**, split | devout-absent / heretical / path-true / gauche, by fit between the act and the actor's own path ([dao-ontology.md](dao-ontology.md), sections 1 and 2). The source's older senses (shame, danger, contempt, rawness, refusal, purity) are human-flavoured and kept only as placeholders. Different surface forms: the reading is selected by relation, path and stance, not by a gloss. | decoration state, actor's path, scene relation, speaker stance | ### Scale decoration in grammar and metaphor [E→I]