red-team-truthseeking
ResearchStrategy: Systematic adversarial probing retuned for truth-seeking. Threat surface = the set of load-bearing claims. Output is NOT a resilience score and NOT a hardening list — it is, per claim, the specific observation/computation that would refute it, plus which attacks succeeded. Methods: UFMCS Key Assumptions Check (repurposed), CIA Devil's Advocacy, Platt strong inference.
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Red Team (Truth-Seeking Variant)
A retuning of systematic red-teaming. Classic red-teaming enumerates a threat surface, fires attack vectors, and outputs a resilience score (0.0-1.0) plus a list of hardening actions. Two things make that wrong for research: (1) "resilience score" is a defense metric — it rewards un-attackability, the signature of an unfalsifiable claim; (2) "hardening" means patching the artifact to deflect future attacks — exactly the patchwork anti-pattern we reject. This variant keeps the systematic-probing machinery (it is genuinely good at enumeration and coverage) but changes what we enumerate and what we output.
What changed from the original (red-teaming)
| Element | Original (publication/defense) | This variant (truth-seeking) |
|---|---|---|
| Threat surface | Attackable weaknesses | The set of load-bearing CLAIMS (a claim, not a weakness, is the unit) |
| Per-vector goal | Show the artifact can be attacked | Produce the concrete observation/computation that would refute THIS claim |
| Primary output | Resilience score 0.0-1.0 | Refutation-condition per claim (falsifiable? what would break it?) |
| Secondary output | Hardening / mitigation actions | NONE. Findings route to revise/demote/residue, never to patch-to-survive |
| A claim no attack touches | High resilience (good) | UNFALSIFIABLE (RED — worst outcome) |
Core move: assumption → refutation-condition
For each load-bearing claim, the red team does NOT ask "how can I make this look bad?" It asks Platt's strong-inference question: "What is the experiment/observation/computation whose result would force me to abandon this claim?" If a clean such condition exists, the claim is falsifiable and we record it (this is itself the most valuable product — it tells the next round / the sandbox exactly what to measure). If NO such condition can be constructed, the claim is UNFALSIFIABLE and flagged RED.
Execution
1. Threat-surface = load-bearing claim enumeration (threat-surface-mapping, import & repurpose)
Enumerate every claim the artifact LEANS ON — not decorative restatements, the ones that, if false, collapse a downstream conclusion. Sort by load: how many downstream conclusions depend on each. Priority targets are the claims that carry the most weight and the claims stated most confidently relative to their evidence.
2. Key-Assumptions-Check (import key-assumptions-check SOP, repurposed)
For each claim, surface the hidden assumptions it rides on. Classify each assumption: SUPPORTED (we have evidence) / ASSERTED (we just believe it) / CONVENIENT (it makes the story prettier — high suspicion, ties to elegance-trap). ASSERTED and CONVENIENT assumptions are the priority attack targets.
3. Refutation-condition construction (the truth-seeking core)
For each claim, attempt to construct its refutation-condition (the strong-inference test). Three results:
- Clean condition found → record it. Claim is falsifiable. This feeds circular-validation-audit (can the sandbox actually run this test non-circularly?) and the next-round sandbox spec.
- Condition exists but requires an external oracle (real wet-lab, ground truth we cannot synthesize) → record as falsifiable-but-not-by-compute; goes to honest residue with cost noted.
- No condition constructible → UNFALSIFIABLE, RED flag, demote.
4. Attack execution (probe-execution, import)
Where a refutation-condition is constructible by reasoning/compute NOW, actually attempt the refutation (counterexample search, derivation check, limiting-case evaluation). Record success/failure honestly. A successful refutation = BROKEN. A failed severe refutation = CORROBORATED.
5. Devil's-advocacy pass (import devils-advocacy SOP)
One dedicated subagent argues the strongest case that the WHOLE artifact is a seductive product of our own framing — not to be balanced, but to make sure the prettiest claims got the hardest look.
What this strategy does NOT produce
- No
resilience score. We do not summarize truth as a number between 0 and 1. - No
hardening actions. If a claim is weak, we revise/demote/shelve it; we never armor it against scrutiny. - No verdict that the artifact "passed." Individual claims get buckets; the artifact as a whole gets a ledger.
Output
RefutationSurfaceMap: per load-bearing claim → {load rank | hidden assumptions classified SUPPORTED/ASSERTED/CONVENIENT | refutation-condition (clean / oracle-only / none) | if attacked: refutation attempted + outcome bucket}. Plus the devil's-advocate brief on the artifact-as-framing-artifact risk.