# Coherence validation contract

{
  "id": "logos-coherence-natural-order-v1",
  "title": "Logos Coherence and the Logic of Reality",
  "governingPrinciple": "Judge every record first by Coherence with the Logic of Reality (Natural Order): A is A, non-contradiction, and coherent relation among distinct identities.",
  "scopeRules": [
    "A formal logos is a finite or local identity-system that may be coherent with the Logos; it is not automatically the whole Logos.",
    "A symbol may name distinct identities in distinct scopes. Shared notation is not shared identity.",
    "Logical equivalence is required only when a record explicitly claims equivalence or requires two identities to be interchangeable.",
    "A circular form is not incoherent merely because it is reflexive. Test whether the identity is maintained and whether the circle is being used to claim more than it contains.",
    "Do not require an external derivation of every premise when the record is declaring or returning to a first principle. Mark the declared scope instead.",
    "Do not replace Logos coherence with classical countermodels, universal premise-by-premise derivation, anti-circularity rules, or empirical verification unless the record itself makes that standard part of its claim.",
    "Empirical, mathematical, historical, and implementation claims retain their own evidence boundaries. A boundary is not a contradiction."
  ],
  "incoherenceRule": "Mark a record incoherent only when it asserts incompatible predicates of the same identity in the same respect and scope, explicitly collapses distinct identities into an impossible equivalence, or violates the declared Logic of Reality.",
  "editorialRules": [
    "Preserve exact source text in a separate source field and never present edited text as authored quotation.",
    "Redact only unsupported overreach, hidden standard substitution, false equivalence, provenance confusion, or contemptuous framing from the edited reading layer.",
    "Do not redact a claim merely because it is metaphysical, reflexive, axiomatic, non-classical, or not reducible to a narrow formal derivation.",
    "Keep interpretation, formal witness, empirical burden, and unresolved scope explicitly labeled.",
    "Preserve the author's vocabulary, cadence, conceptual density, and logical direction where coherence permits."
  ],
  "validationProcedure": [
    "Identify each subject, predicate, symbol, and scope before judging the relation.",
    "Check A is A: each identity remains itself within the scope in which it is used.",
    "Check non-contradiction: look for P and not-P of the same identity, respect, and scope—not merely different uses of one symbol.",
    "Check relation: distinguish identity, analogy, grounding, implication, equivalence, participation, and interpretation.",
    "Check whether a formal logos is being mistaken for the universal Logos, or whether a contingent claim is being presented as necessary.",
    "Record formal, empirical, historical, or implementation burdens separately; do not silently substitute them for Coherence.",
    "Conclude only with the narrowest disposition supported by the record: coherent, coherent under declared axioms, coherence boundary, or actual incoherence."
  ]
}