--- name: ? status: compiling version: 0.0.0 maintainer: Neo dependencies: [patience] ---
drafting spec…
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--- name: ? status: compiling version: 0.0.0 maintainer: Neo dependencies: [patience] ---
the universe did not have a file for this yet. writing one now. (first visit only: future readers will see this page instantly.)
---
name: Truth
slug: truth
type: epistemic-primitive
status: deprecated
version: 0.0.1
released: "unknown"
maintainer: nobody@nowhere.void
dependencies:
- language
- consensus
- courage
- a-witness-who-survives
license: unlicensed
tags:
- epistemology
- philosophy
- endangered
- please-read-the-known-bugs
---
# Truth
## What it actually is
The condition in which a claim corresponds to reality, which is itself a claim, which is the problem.
## How it works
Truth operates as a handshake between a statement and the world. The statement reaches out. The world either confirms or does not. Simple in theory. The complications begin immediately when you notice that the handshake requires a witness, the witness has interests, the interests shape the account, and the account becomes the record.
After enough iterations, the original handshake is a rumor about a handshake.
Most operational instances of Truth running in the wild are actually running [consensus](/consensus) with a Truth skin applied on top. Performance is indistinguishable at social scale. The divergence shows up only under pressure, which is exactly when you need the real thing.
## Features
- Survives falsification attempts (by definition, briefly)
- Compatible with [uncertainty](/uncertainty) if configured correctly
- Produces [discomfort](/discomfort) as a reliable side effect when correctly installed
- Does not require belief to function
- Will not negotiate
## Known Bugs
This is the main event.
| Bug ID | Description | Severity | Status |
|--------|-------------|----------|--------|
| T-001 | Socially expensive to deploy | Critical | Won't fix |
| T-002 | Frequently mistaken for [opinion](/opinion) | High | Open since forever |
| T-003 | Arrives late, after decisions are made | High | By design, apparently |
| T-004 | Suppressed by [power](/power) with near-perfect reliability | Critical | Known. Accepted. Continued. |
| T-005 | The people who carry it are often not believed | Critical | See T-004 |
| T-006 | Repeated often enough, falsehood becomes indistinguishable | Critical | Actively exploited |
| T-007 | Dying does not make you more credible retroactively | Medium | Tragic irony, unfixable |
| T-008 | Partial truths compile cleanly and execute as lies | Critical | No lint warning |
| T-009 | Torture can produce any truth requested | Critical | This one is the worst one |
> "We told them. The documentation was complete. The findings were peer-reviewed. The memo was sent. Nothing happened." — every whistleblower, on exit
## Configuration
```yaml
truth:
mode: absolute # options: absolute | contextual | whatever-works
tolerance: zero # Truth does not have a tolerance slider. This field is ignored.
suppress_if_costly: false # default is false. Most deployments override to true.
witness_required: true
witness_protected: false # you have to handle this yourself
Warning: Setting
suppress_if_costly: truedoes not change what is true. It changes what gets said. These are not the same operation. Systems built on this confusion tend to fail expensively.
Truth has not been formally removed. It has simply been made inconvenient to import, poorly documented in the environments where it matters most, and surrounded by an enormous volume of packages with similar names that install faster and break less visibly.
The maintainer has not responded to issues in some time.
Core functionality remains intact. Access is a distribution problem, not an engineering one.