core/docs/specs/foundational-families

Foundational Substrate Family Specifications

This directory contains the controlled foundational family specifications for the K–8 cognitive substrate, as mandated by ADR-0224.

Core Principles

1. Gate for Implementation Slices A complete and approved family specification document in this directory is a strict constitutional requirement before any implementation slice for that family is authorized. These specifications act as architectural gating artifacts, not runtime behavior.

2. Extension of ADR-0223 Doctrine All future family design and implementation must strictly adhere to the canonical rule defined in ADR-0223:

   Closeness proposes; bindings ground; contracts determine.

   • Semantic closeness proposes: Lexical cues and, where implemented, exact substrate/CGA neighborhood retrieval may identify candidate affordances.
   • Exact bindings ground: Span-grounded bindings map values to roles.
   • Organ-specific contracts determine: Contract assessments verify completeness, topology, and absence of hazards before admitting a candidate.

3. Benchmarks as Diagnostic Lanes Only Benchmarks, such as GSM8K, are valuable diagnostic pressure lanes to identify gaps, verify behavior, and test morphology. They never define the substrate. The substrate is defined by minimal, reusable constructional affordances across elementary and middle school subjects.

Directory Structure

• TEMPLATE.md: The mandatory section structure every family specification must populate.
• quantity-entity-binding.md: Specification for the quantity-entity binding family.
• state-change.md: Specification for the state-change family.