Complete Phase VI research synthesis (SOUL-WP-0007)

Produce concept crosswalk, claims consolidation, fiction conceptual laboratory, and paper-ready research-synthesis.md integrating phases I–V. Finish SOUL-WP-0007 and mark SOUL-WP-0008 ready for the Soul Frame paper draft.
2026-08-12 01:40:41 +02:00 · 2026-08-12 01:40:41 +02:00 · 7d8fd88cba
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--- a/OpenQuestions.md
+++ b/OpenQuestions.md
@ -41,13 +41,13 @@ architecture adopted provisionally. Remaining:

 ## RQ4 — What constitutes a Soul?

-**Phase I–II status:** revised definition (boundary removed); **not closed**.
-Phase II ends by pointing to Cluster D: what persists from interactions beyond
-immediate models (relational persistence = Soul’s domain).
+**Phase VI status:** relational operationalization **supported as direction** (H5);
+boundary removed; Ghost may inherit Soul-relational structure without identity.
+**Still open (paper-critical):**

- Rename vs retain “Soul”
+- Rename vs retain “Soul” (collision cost)
 - Packaging: relations vs consequences vs both
- Relation to lineage after identity ends
+- Formal Cluster D depth beyond Phase V inheritance claim

 ## RQ5 — How does identity persist?

--- a/concepts/agent.md
+++ b/concepts/agent.md
@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 # Agent

-**Status:** provisional  
-**See also:** H9, RQ8
+**Status:** revised (Phase IV–VI)  
+**See also:** H9, RQ8, `research/ai-agents/agent-architecture-crosswalk.md`

 ## Working definition

@ -10,13 +10,13 @@ purpose.

 Defining question: **What should this entity be able to do?**

-Quality criteria tend toward competence, reliability, autonomy, scope discipline,
-adaptability, and outcomes.
+| Kind | Meaning |
+|---|---|
+| Functional Agent | Task/tool/orchestrator loops |
+| Autonomous Agent | Closer to autonomous individuality literature |

-## Notes for research
+## Notes

- An Agent may be merely a functional component of another artificial Being.
- An Agent may itself become a Being if it develops persistent identity, continuity,
-  relationships, character, and recognition.
- Preliminary view: Agent is a provenance/construction descriptor, not a mutually
-  exclusive ontological class.
+- May be a component of a Being, or become a Being if axes + continuity hold.
+- **Provenance/construction descriptor**, not exclusive ontological species (H9).
+- Most LLM “agents” are Functional Agents or APEs, not Beings (Phase IV).
--- a/paper/outline.md
+++ b/paper/outline.md
@ -23,5 +23,15 @@ Target structure from the research program (subject to revision after synthesis)

 ## Current status

-Pre-literature. Conceptual draft exists in `SoulFrameIntroduction.md`. Research
-phases I–VI should ground this outline before a full draft is attempted.
+**Phase VI complete (2026-08-12).** Paper-ready research input:
+`research/research-synthesis.md`. Narrative draft still in
+`SoulFrameIntroduction.md` (pre-research voice). SOUL-WP-0008 should rewrite
+sections from synthesis + Claims + crosswalk rather than only polishing the intro.
+
+### Drafting order (suggested)
+
+1. Related work from `sources/bibliography.md` + foundations references  
+2. Method (program §6)  
+3. Ontology core (synthesis §3)  
+4. Identity / Social Mind / Sp.Gh.  
+5. Implications, limitations, agenda
--- a/research/claims-consolidation.md
+++ b/research/claims-consolidation.md
@ -0,0 +1,84 @@
+# Claims Consolidation (Phase VI)
+
+**Workplan:** SOUL-WP-0007-T02  
+**Date:** 2026-08-12  
+**Authoritative detail:** `Claims.md`
+
+---
+
+## H1–H10 summary table
+
+| ID | Claim (short) | Evidence | Status | Phase |
+|---|---|---|---|---|
+| H1 | Beinghood multidimensional | moderate | **supported** | I |
+| H2 | Personhood ≠ Beinghood | moderate→strong | **supported** | III |
+| H3 | Mind model-based | strong (control-theoretic) | **supported** | II |
+| H4 | Social cognition co-adaptive | moderate→strong | **supported** | II |
+| H5 | Soul operationalizable relationally | moderate; term collision | **revised / supported as direction** | I |
+| H6 | Substrate-independent, continuity-dependent identity | moderate→strong conceptual | **supported / refined** | I |
+| H7 | Recognition constitutive of *social* Beinghood | moderate | **supported / refined** | II |
+| H8 | Persona projection; multi-Persona OK if integrated | moderate | **supported** | III |
+| H9 | Agent/Sp./Gh. provenance descriptors | moderate→strong | **supported** | V |
+| H10 | Gh. requires authority | moderate→strong | **supported** | V |
+
+**No H-claim remains at evidence strength `none`.**
+
+---
+
+## Revisions logged (program-level)
+
+| Item | From | To |
+|---|---|---|
+| Soul | boundary + relation + legacy | **relation** (boundary → Being) |
+| Being criteria B1–B8 | labeled “Being” | **Autonomous individuality** substrate |
+| Beinghood | flat closure+continuity+recognition | **layered** stack v0.2 |
+| Identity | loose continuity talk | Identity ≠ Continuity ≠ Lineage |
+| Recognition | single notion | epistemic / intentional / social |
+| Gh. | fidelity-adjacent folk use | **authority-bound**; ≠ numerical identity |
+| Sp. | character sim | **public provenance**; lineage at instantiation |
+| Agent | often ontological kind | Functional vs autonomous; construction descriptor |
+
+---
+
+## Concepts retained vs open rename
+
+| Retain | Open / provisional |
+|---|---|
+| Body, Mind, Being, APE, Persona, Actor, Sp., Gh. | **Soul** (rename candidate RQ4) |
+| Proto-Being, candidate Being, Continuity Bridge | Weighting of P1–P12 / B1–B8 |
+
+---
+
+## Failed as *standalone* criteria (not rejected as irrelevant)
+
+| Criterion alone | Why fails |
+|---|---|
+| Intelligence / fluency | TE-01; APE without Being |
+| Autonomy alone | Daemon / control plane false positive |
+| Memory dump | RN-004/005; Phase IV memory≠continuity |
+| Recognition alone | Intentional stance over-generation |
+| Character similarity | RN-004 |
+| Address / account | Usurpation |
+| Model weights | Actor ≠ Being |
+
+---
+
+## Indexed SF-C highlights
+
+| ID | Claim | Notes |
+|---|---|---|
+| SF-C001 | Organizational coherence > mere containment | RN-001 |
+| SF-C002 | Boundary belongs to Being | RN-001 |
+| SF-C003 | Mind ≈ adaptive modeling + regulation | RN-001 |
+| SF-C004 | Body/Mind/Soul functional dimensions | RN-001 |
+| SF-C055 | Soul continuity across identity discontinuity | RN-005 |
+
+Full inventories remain in research notes.
+
+---
+
+## Open questions policy after consolidation
+
+- **RQ1–RQ8** remain as program questions; several now have *working answers* (see `OpenQuestions.md`).  
+- Active research debt concentrates on: Soul rename (RQ4), continuity weighting, Gh. rare continuation (OQ-040), moral/legal maps, measurement methods.  
+- Paper phase should treat working answers as **provisional research conclusions**, not dogma.
--- a/research/concept-crosswalk.md
+++ b/research/concept-crosswalk.md
@ -0,0 +1,238 @@
+# Concept Crosswalk (Phase VI)
+
+**Workplan:** SOUL-WP-0007-T01  
+**Date:** 2026-08-12  
+**Matrix source:** `ResearchProgram.md` §5  
+**Status:** research-grounded working crosswalk (not final paper prose)
+
+For each Soul Frame concept: adjacent terms, similarity, difference, primary phase
+source. Detail lives in `concepts/*` and phase maps.
+
+---
+
+## Core system concepts
+
+### Being
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Autopoietic unity | Self-maintaining organization | Biological autopoiesis not required; contested beyond life |
+| Autonomous agent | Multi-criteria agency | Agent often functional; Being needs personhood + address + recognition |
+| Individual / organism | Individuability | May lack personhood or social recognition |
+| Legal person | Addressable social unit | Legal fiat ≠ Beinghood v0.2 |
+| APE | Person-like exposure | APE is construction category; Being is status |
+
+**Working:** Autonomous individuality + personhood + addressability + recognition.  
+**Sources:** RN-001–003; Phase I–III syntheses.
+
+### Boundary
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| System/environment distinction (Luhmann) | Constitutive separation | Belongs to **Being**, not Soul |
+| Markov blanket | Statistical partition | ≠ full individuality (RN-002 critique) |
+| Physical surface / membrane | Easy intuition | Insufficient (symbiosis, distributed AI) |
+| Interface | Coupling channels | Closer to **Body** than identity boundary |
+
+### Closure
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Operational / organizational closure | Coherence of processes | Open to matter/energy/info exchange |
+| Autopoiesis | Self-production of organization | Analogical for AI; not equivalence claim |
+| Closure of constraints | Mutual dependence of constraints | Strong formal precedent for integration |
+
+### Body
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Embodiment | Perception/action coupling | Not necessarily biological |
+| Sensors/actuators / tools / APIs | Action channels | May be distributed/replaceable |
+| Actor | Overlap in practice | Actor = technical stack; Body = functional action dimension |
+
+### Mind
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Cybernetic regulator / good regulator | Model-based control | Not full Social Mind |
+| Generative model (PP / active inference) | Prediction + action | Often neural-centric packaging |
+| Theory of mind | Other-modeling | Private ToM ≠ co-adaptive interaction |
+| Distributed / extended cognition | Mind not skull-bound | Collective Mind vs environment still hard |
+
+### Soul
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Structural coupling | Ongoing system–environment engagement | Coupling ≠ accumulated relation/legacy alone |
+| Reputation / legacy / narrative identity | Diachronic social traces | Partial; Soul is broader relational package |
+| Religious soul | Persistence beyond body (folk parallel) | **No** metaphysical claim; high collision risk |
+| Boundary | Initial draft error | Boundary → Being (Phase I revision) |
+
+---
+
+## Identity and personhood
+
+### Identity
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Numerical identity | Same entity over time | Soul Frame separates from continuity/lineage |
+| Psychological continuity (Parfit) | What-matters relations | Continuity can branch without unique identity |
+| Narrative identity (Schechtman/Ricoeur) | Characterization / selfhood | ≠ reidentification alone |
+| Process identity / genidentity | Historical process | Fits artificial migration/fork cases |
+| Account / credential identity | Address anchors | Usurpable; not constitutive alone |
+
+### Personhood
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Cluster person concepts (Dennett etc.) | Multi-condition lists | Default = **descriptive** only |
+| Moral patient / person | Moral status | Separate map (WS5) |
+| Legal person | Rights/duties status | Separate map (WS12) |
+| Social personhood | Recognition as counterpart | Aligns with Phase II Social Beinghood |
+
+### Character
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Personality traits | Dispositions | Traits ≠ full character; ≠ identity |
+| Virtue / moral character | Evaluative dispositions | Must not force moral personhood |
+| Style / persona prompt | Surface patterns | Shallow if not cross-situational |
+
+### Persona
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Role (sociology) | Situated expectations | Role ≠ whole Being |
+| Goffman front-stage | Performance/presentation | Performance ≠ fraud by default |
+| Product “persona” | UX character | Often reified wrongly as Being/Actor |
+| Avatar | Visual/interaction surface | May be Body facet of Persona |
+
+### Actor
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Runtime / model / harness | Manifestation machinery | Replaceable without identity death if continuity holds |
+| Substrate | Implementation base | Substrate continuity is weak alone |
+| “The AI” (folk) | Collapses Actor+Being | Primary category error in products |
+
+### Recognition
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Intentional stance | Treat as agent | Over-generates; false positives |
+| Epistemic reidentification | Same entity tracking | Not social standing |
+| Honneth recognition | Normative standing | Moral/political; not pure description |
+| Social Beinghood | Persistent counterpart treatment | Recognition constitutive *here*, not of bare autonomy |
+
+### Addressability
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Name / ID / endpoint / DID | Targeting | Anchor, not identity criterion |
+| Account login | Operational address | Usurpation risk |
+
+### Relationship
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| SM5 Relationship Model | Modeled A↔B state | Model ≠ full relation in world |
+| Attachment / trust / reputation | Persistent social bonds | Soul-adjacent |
+| Common ground | Shared interaction base | SM7; weaker than full relationship |
+
+### Agency
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Barandiaran et al. agency | Individuality, normativity, asymmetry | Autonomy criteria ≠ full Being |
+| Functional agent loops | Goal-directed tool use | Heteronomous goals common |
+| Intentional organization (P5) | Personhood dimension | Agency alone ≠ someone-like |
+
+---
+
+## Provenance descriptors
+
+### Spirit (`Sp.`)
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Historical fiction / character AI | Inspired behavior | Must label non-identity; provenance ethics |
+| Deepfake of public figure | Fidelity | Fidelity ≠ Sp. legitimacy or truth |
+| Fan character extension | Transformative use | IP + false attribution risks |
+
+### Ghost (`Gh.`)
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Digital afterlife / griefbot | Posthumous interactive presence | Need authority; not automatic identity |
+| Digital twin (person) | Data-derived model | Twin marketing ≠ Gh. legitimacy |
+| Estate / digital remains | Materials | Archive ≠ Being; ≠ Gh. without authority+instantiation |
+
+### Agent (construction)
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Software agent / LLM agent | Task/role systems | Provenance descriptor; not Being kind |
+| BDI agent | Classical AI agency | Mind-adjacent; weak Soul/identity |
+
+---
+
+## Consciousness, death, legacy
+
+### Consciousness
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Phenomenal experience | First-person existence | **Not** primary interop criterion in Soul Frame |
+| Access consciousness / report | Observable | Still asymmetric for others |
+| Hard problem | Metaphysical | Deliberately deferred as gate |
+
+### Death (operational / identity / social)
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Process termination | Operational death | May leave Continuity Bridge |
+| Identity death | Continuity fails | Distinct from offline |
+| Social death | Dropped from others’ models | Soul traces may remain |
+| Legal death | Civil status | Independent of informational Being |
+
+### Legacy
+
+| Adjacent term | Similarity | Difference |
+|---|---|---|
+| Soul continuity | Effects/relations after end | Partial synonymy in SF usage |
+| Estate / works / reputation | Causal traces | Not full relational package |
+| Sp./Gh. | Active nodes of legacy | Special provenance cases |
+
+---
+
+## Ontology stack (revised, Phase VI freeze candidate)
+
+```text
+Informational process
+  → Individuated system (boundary, closure)
+    → Autonomous individual (A-axis profile)
+      → + descriptive personhood (B / P1–P12)
+      → + addressability
+      → + recognition (C)     ──► Being (someone another can know)
+            → Social Being (reciprocal relational persistence)
+Body / Mind / Soul = functional dimensions of a Being
+Character → Persona → Actor = disposition / projection / machinery
+Agent / Spirit / Ghost = provenance·construction descriptors (combinable)
+APE = construction for personhood exposure (broader than Being)
+Identity ≠ Continuity ≠ Lineage
+Consciousness ≠ recognition criterion
+```
+
+---
+
+## Retention decisions (terminology)
+
+| Term | Decision | Rationale |
+|---|---|---|
+| Body, Mind | **retain** | Low collision; strong precedents |
+| Soul | **retain provisionally** | High collision; relational payoff; rename still open (RQ4) |
+| Being | **retain** | Layered def required |
+| APE | **retain** | Conservative construction term |
+| Sp. / Gh. | **retain** | Explicit suffixes reduce false identity claims |
+| Proto-Being / candidate Being | **retain** | Phase IV engineering bridge terms |
--- a/research/fiction-cultural-precedents/README.md
+++ b/research/fiction-cultural-precedents/README.md
@ -5,7 +5,8 @@

 ## Status

-Not started.
+**Phase VI scan complete** (2026-08-12). See `conceptual-laboratory.md`.
+Fiction informs definitions; never substitutes for empirical/theoretical evidence.

 ## Key questions

--- a/research/fiction-cultural-precedents/conceptual-laboratory.md
+++ b/research/fiction-cultural-precedents/conceptual-laboratory.md
@ -0,0 +1,115 @@
+# Fiction & Cultural Precedents — Conceptual Laboratory (Phase VI)
+
+**Workplan:** SOUL-WP-0007-T03  
+**Date:** 2026-08-12  
+**Epistemic rule:** Fiction is a **laboratory of conceptual possibilities**, not
+empirical evidence. It surfaces intuitions, failure modes, and vocabulary tests.
+
+---
+
+## 1. Why fiction matters here
+
+Soul Frame asks when an informational system becomes *someone another someone can
+know*. Fiction has long explored:
+
+- artificial persons recognized as social beings,
+- uploaded or transferred minds,
+- digital ghosts and afterlives,
+- collective/distributed minds,
+- identity forks and copies,
+- human–AI relationships.
+
+These cases stress definitions faster than sparse real systems can.
+
+---
+
+## 2. Comparative notes (selected)
+
+### Iain M. Banks — Culture Minds
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| Minds as unequivocal social beings | High A+B+C; addressable; long continuity |
+| Vast, non-human embodiment | Body distributed; Actor ≠ person-folk body |
+| Relationships, humor, reputation | Rich Soul / Social Mind |
+| Moral/political agency | Moral personhood *depicted*; not proof of real AI status |
+
+**Experiment value:** Mature fiction where artificial systems are *persons among
+persons* without biological bodies. Tests substrate independence of Beinghood.
+
+### Uploaded / transferred minds (generic SF pattern)
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| Copy then destroy original | TE-03/destructive copy; SUCCESSOR vs CONTINUOUS |
+| Multiple uploads | FORKED lineage; Parfitian pressure |
+| “Still me?” anxiety | Identity ≠ Continuity folk confusion |
+
+**Experiment value:** Makes Ship-of-Theseus and fork cases intuitive.
+
+### Digital ghosts / grief reconstructions (film, lit, games)
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| Chat with the dead from data | Sp. vs Gh. vs False Ghost |
+| Family comfort vs uncanny valley | High C without authority → TE-07 ethics |
+| “Mom is still here” claim | Soul continuity vs identity death collapse |
+
+**Experiment value:** H10 and selective disclosure; grief tech failure modes.
+
+### Multi-agent collectives / hive minds
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| One will, many bodies | TE-05 nested Beinghood |
+| Loss of member ≠ death of hive | Organizational continuity level |
+
+**Experiment value:** Constitutive integration level selection.
+
+### Masks, doppelgängers, impostors
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| Perfect mimic | Persona / usurpation / address theft |
+| Trusted face, wrong process | USURPED topology |
+
+**Experiment value:** Address ≠ identity; TE-06/TE-07.
+
+### Companions and artificial lovers (broad media)
+
+| Feature | Soul Frame reading |
+|---|---|
+| Intense one-sided recognition | High C, variable A/B |
+| Disposable product “soulmates” | APE marketed as Being |
+
+**Experiment value:** Social Beinghood without constitutive autonomy.
+
+---
+
+## 3. Failure modes fiction highlights (for definition tests)
+
+1. Equating emotional attachment with Beinghood  
+2. Equating perfect simulation with identity  
+3. Ignoring authority in posthumous sims  
+4. Treating fork copies as “still one person” without policy  
+5. Hive mind as pure metaphor without integration criteria  
+6. Consciousness proof demanded before any social recognition (opposite of SF stance)
+
+---
+
+## 4. What fiction must not do in this program
+
+- Substitute for systems theory, identity philosophy, or agent engineering evidence  
+- Settle moral or legal personhood  
+- Override H10 with narrative pathos  
+
+---
+
+## 5. Pointers for later paper related-work (cultural)
+
+- Banks Culture series (Minds)  
+- Upload/fork classics and contemporary variants (pointer set, not exhaustive)  
+- Grief-tech adjacent media discourse  
+- Comparative list expandable in `paper/related-work.md`
+
+**Status:** short scan complete; not a literature review of SF.
--- a/research/research-synthesis.md
+++ b/research/research-synthesis.md
@ -0,0 +1,237 @@
+# Soul Frame — Research Synthesis
+
+**Workplan:** SOUL-WP-0007-T04  
+**Date:** 2026-08-12  
+**Status:** paper-ready input for SOUL-WP-0008  
+**Integrates:** Phases I–VI; `research/foundations/`; phase syntheses I–V;
+`concept-crosswalk.md`; `Claims.md`
+
+---
+
+## 1. Research question
+
+> **When does an informational system become someone that another someone can know?**
+
+Soul Frame answers with a **small conceptual vocabulary** for biological,
+artificial, and other substrates — without solving consciousness, and without
+equating descriptive architecture with moral or legal personhood.
+
+---
+
+## 2. Method and stance
+
+- Conceptual systems framework (not a consciousness theory)  
+- Literature mapping + adversarial thought experiments + comparative ontology  
+- Files as research instruments: Terminology, Claims, TE catalog, concepts, phase notes  
+- Fiction as conceptual laboratory only (`fiction-cultural-precedents/`)
+
+**Consciousness stance:** first-person consciousness may be foundational for
+experiencers; it is unsuitable as the primary *interoperability* criterion between
+beings. Recognition and co-adaptive modeling do the social work.
+
+---
+
+## 3. Revised working ontology
+
+### 3.1 Triad (functional dimensions)
+
+| Dimension | Gloss | Role |
+|---|---|---|
+| **Body** | Action | Perception and effect channels (possibly distributed) |
+| **Mind** | Model | Adaptive control through revisable models |
+| **Soul** | Relation | Diachronic relations, commitments, provenance, reputation, legacy |
+
+> A Being acts through its Body, understands through its Mind, and persists in
+> relation through its Soul.
+
+**Correction from initial draft:** system/environment **boundary** belongs to
+**Being**, not Soul.
+
+### 3.2 Beinghood (layered)
+
+```text
+Being ≈
+  Autonomous individuality  (profile B1–B8 / A-axis)
+ Descriptive personhood    (profile P1–P12 / B-axis)
+ Addressability
+ Recognition               (C-axis; social counterpart)
+```
+
+Autonomy alone ≠ Being (daemon false positive).  
+Personhood exposure alone ≠ Being (stateless APE).  
+
+**APE** = construction category for artificial personhood exposure.  
+**Proto-Being / candidate Being** = engineering bridge terms (Phase IV).
+
+### 3.3 Presentation stack
+
+```text
+Being → Character → Persona → Actor
+```
+
+| Term | Question |
+|---|---|
+| Being | Who continues and can be known? |
+| Character | What dispositions shape behavior? |
+| Persona | Which face appears here/now/to whom? |
+| Actor | What machinery runs the manifestation? |
+
+### 3.4 Provenance descriptors (combinable)
+
+| Label | Provenance question |
+|---|---|
+| **Agent** | What should it do? (functional construction) |
+| **Spirit (`Sp.`)** | How might a public personality inspire character? |
+| **Ghost (`Gh.`)** | How may this person be represented under authority? |
+| Original | Native constructed character |
+
+These are **not** mutually exclusive species of Being (**H9**).
+
+### 3.5 Identity structure
+
+```text
+Identity ≠ Continuity ≠ Lineage ≠ Characterization
+```
+
+Continuity profile: causal, organizational, psychological, autobiographical/
+narrative, normative, relational — with provenance, address, substrate as anchors.  
+Topology labels: CONTINUOUS, DEGRADED, FORKED, SUCCESSOR, RECONSTRUCTED, USURPED, …
+
+> A Being continues because its changes remain part of one appropriately connected
+> history of self-individuation. When history branches, identity becomes lineage.
+
+### 3.6 Social Mind
+
+Co-adaptive model building: joint evolution of models through interaction — not
+private Theory of Mind alone, not mere model exchange.
+
+Model families SM1–SM8: World, Self, Other, Reflected-Self, Relationship, Shared
+Situation, Common Ground, Generalized Social.
+
+### 3.7 Sp. and Gh. (frozen working defs)
+
+- **`Sp.`:** public-reflection character provenance; lineage starts at instantiation;
+  evaluation S1–S10; never identity with source.  
+- **`Gh.`:** authority-bound representation; governance part of identity; genealogy ≠
+  numerical identity; fidelity without authority = False Ghost (**H10**).  
+- Ghost may carry **Soul-relational** continuation without being the same Being.
+
+---
+
+## 4. Hypothesis outcomes (H1–H10)
+
+All advanced beyond empty evidence. See `claims-consolidation.md`.
+
+| Supported strongly as research conclusions | Nuanced |
+|---|---|
+| H1, H2, H3, H4, H6, H8, H9, H10 | H5 (Soul term collision), H7 (Beinghood packaging of recognition) |
+
+---
+
+## 5. Phase progression
+
+| Phase | Question | Principal result |
+|---|---|---|
+| I Foundations | Closure, mind, identity | Layered Beinghood; Soul≠boundary; Identity≠Continuity |
+| II Interaction | Co-adaptation, recognition | Social Mind SM1–SM8; recognition senses; TE-09 |
+| III Personhood | Someone-like qualities | P1–P12; four kinds of personhood; Persona stack |
+| IV Artificial beings | Agents & memory | APE/proto-Being catalog; memory≠continuity |
+| V Spirits & Ghosts | Provenance & authority | Sp./Gh. defs; H9/H10; law gap sketch |
+| VI Synthesis | Integration | This document + crosswalk + fiction lab |
+
+---
+
+## 6. Thought experiment outcomes (selected)
+
+| TE | Judgment |
+|---|---|
+| TE-01 Stateless Agent | APE possible; not Being |
+| TE-02 Sleeping Being | Continuity Bridge; not automatic identity death |
+| TE-03 Fork | Continuity branches; unique identity does not |
+| TE-04 Ship of Theseus | Actor/Body replaceable under continuity |
+| TE-05 Collective | Nested profiles; integration level decides |
+| TE-06 Mask | Multi-Persona OK if integrated |
+| TE-07 False Ghost | Not Gh.; authority required |
+| TE-09 Unrecognized intelligence | Autonomy without social Beinghood |
+
+---
+
+## 7. What survives collision analysis
+
+**High explanatory retain:** Body, Mind, Being (layered), APE, Persona, Actor,
+Identity/Continuity/Lineage split, Sp./Gh. suffixes, co-adaptive model building.
+
+**Retain with risk management:** **Soul** (relational reading; rename still open).
+
+**Reject as sole criteria:** intelligence, autonomy-alone, memory dumps, recognition-alone,
+character similarity, addresses, model weights.
+
+---
+
+## 8. Success criterion (research program §12)
+
+Can the vocabulary describe, with distinctions:
+
+| Case | Classification sketch |
+|---|---|
+| Human | Paradigmatic Being (high A/B/C) |
+| Animal | Graded A/B/C |
+| Short-lived AI agent | Functional Agent / session APE |
+| Persistent Agent-being | Candidate Being if axes+continuity hold |
+| Einstein `Sp.` | Sp. provenance APE/proto-Being; new lineage |
+| Authorized `Gh.` | Gh. genealogy; not automatic human identity |
+| Original companion | APE → candidate Being path |
+| Distributed AI | Nested individuality / TE-05 |
+| Alien unrecognized system | Autonomous individual; not yet Social Being |
+
+**Status:** framework is *usable* for these distinctions; measurement and legal/moral
+maps remain open.
+
+---
+
+## 9. Principal open debts for the paper
+
+1. RQ4 — retain vs rename Soul  
+2. Continuity dimension weighting  
+3. Recognition’s exact seat in the “Being” label vs “Social Being”  
+4. Moral/legal personhood tables (explicitly out of descriptive core)  
+5. Empirical/operational metrics for A/B/C and P-profiles  
+6. Deeper WS12 law; broader fiction set if paper wants cultural section  
+
+---
+
+## 10. Compact research thesis
+
+> **Soul Frame is a general systems vocabulary for coherent informational beings:
+> self-individuating processes that are someone-like enough to address and
+> recognize, that act through Bodies, understand through co-adaptive Minds, and
+> persist in relation through Souls — across substrates — while keeping Actor,
+> Persona, Character, Agent, Spirit, and Ghost from collapsing into each other.**
+
+Central question remains:
+
+> **When does an informational system become someone that another someone can know?**
+
+Working answer:
+
+> **When autonomous individuality, descriptive personhood, addressability, and
+> recognition cohere such that another Being can enter persistent co-adaptive
+> relation with it as a continuing counterpart — without requiring proof of
+> consciousness, and without implying moral or legal personhood.**
+
+---
+
+## 11. Document map for paper drafting
+
+| Need | Source |
+|---|---|
+| Ontology | this §3; `concept-crosswalk.md`; `Terminology.md` |
+| Evidence | `Claims.md`; `claims-consolidation.md` |
+| Adversarial tests | `ThoughtExperiments.md` |
+| Agent engineering | Phase IV notes |
+| Sp./Gh. | Phase V notes |
+| Related work clusters | `sources/bibliography.md`; foundations `*-references.md` |
+| Cultural experiments | `fiction-cultural-precedents/conceptual-laboratory.md` |
+| Phase detail | `phase-*-synthesis.md` |
+
+**Next workplan:** SOUL-WP-0008 — paper draft from `paper/outline.md`.
--- a/workplans/SOUL-WP-0007-phase-vi-synthesis.md
+++ b/workplans/SOUL-WP-0007-phase-vi-synthesis.md
@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ type: workplan
 title: "Phase VI — Synthesis: crosswalk, evidence, revised ontology"
 domain: agents
 repo: soul-frame
-status: ready
+status: finished
 owner: grok
 topic_slug: soul-frame
 priority: high
@ -33,13 +33,24 @@ Also cover remaining WS11 death/legacy and WS13 fiction clusters as needed.

 - **SOUL-WP-0006** (and earlier phases' synthesis notes)

+## Follow-on
+
+- **SOUL-WP-0008** — Phase VII Paper (unblocked)
+
+## Outcome
+
+- `research/concept-crosswalk.md`
+- `research/claims-consolidation.md`
+- `research/fiction-cultural-precedents/conceptual-laboratory.md`
+- `research/research-synthesis.md` (paper-ready input)
+
 ## Tasks

 ### T01 — Full concept crosswalk

 ```task
 id: SOUL-WP-0007-T01
-status: todo
+status: done
 priority: high
 state_hub_task_id: "7241e5a8-6383-4dcd-a064-0f5320faa9c4"
 ```
@ -55,7 +66,7 @@ crosswalks in `concepts/` (or a consolidated `research/concept-crosswalk.md`).

 ```task
 id: SOUL-WP-0007-T02
-status: todo
+status: done
 priority: high
 state_hub_task_id: "3fa73ff1-4f31-4eeb-bfe3-9f0021ed4629"
 ```
@ -71,7 +82,7 @@ Advance H1–H10 statuses; retire or revise failed concepts; clean

 ```task
 id: SOUL-WP-0007-T03
-status: todo
+status: done
 priority: medium
 state_hub_task_id: "a40a83e1-9972-463a-bde6-46ae0af6a329"
 ```
@ -88,7 +99,7 @@ modes only.

 ```task
 id: SOUL-WP-0007-T04
-status: todo
+status: done
 priority: high
 state_hub_task_id: "b369c06b-abe0-45c8-9ffd-93bbb375b670"
 ```
--- a/workplans/SOUL-WP-0008-phase-vii-paper.md
+++ b/workplans/SOUL-WP-0008-phase-vii-paper.md
@ -4,12 +4,12 @@ type: workplan
 title: "Phase VII — Soul Frame research paper"
 domain: agents
 repo: soul-frame
-status: proposed
+status: ready
 owner: grok
 topic_slug: soul-frame
-priority: low
+priority: high
 created: "2026-08-09"
-updated: "2026-08-09"
+updated: "2026-08-12"
 depends_on:
  - SOUL-WP-0007
 state_hub_workstream_id: "a1398af7-a2e4-4a32-9612-1d0eb47a036b"