13 References

13 · References

The references are grouped by the nature of the source. The distinction is deliberate: not all sources carry the same evidential weight, and treating them as equivalent would be incorrect. The academic papers and the consolidated practices underpin the foundational claims; the position papers and observational sources are cited for what they are — framings and field observations, not controlled experimental evidence.

Specification as source of truth

Piskala, D. B. (2026). Spec-Driven Development: From Code to Contract in the Age of AI Coding Assistants. arXiv:2602.00180. arxiv.org/abs/2602.00180 — A systematic guide to spec-driven development and its levels of rigour. A practitioner-facing paper, widely cited in the subsequent literature.

Decision log

Nygard, M. (2011). Documenting Architecture Decisions. Cognitect. cognitect.com — The original essay that popularised the Architecture Decision Record; rooted in Kruchten's work on the decision view. A de facto standard, adopted by GDS UK, AWS, ThoughtWorks.

Architectural Decision Records. A collection of templates and practices (the ADR organisation). adr.github.io — The current reference point for formats (Nygard, MADR, Y-Statement) and process.

Memory of reasoning and iterative loops

On state revisitation and on the absence of a structured memory of visited states as its cause: recent literature on reasoning models and agents documents the cyclic return to already-discarded solutions, the semantic (not merely lexical) nature of the phenomenon, and its origin in the localisation of the context window and the absence of an explicit visited-set (studies on reasoning LLMs and reasoning degradation in agents, 2025–2026). Academic papers and observations of agentic practice; the phenomenon is widely encountered in agentic loops, and its mitigation through structured context is the object of current work.

Anchoring vocabulary and sources

On semantic drift (the sliding between legitimate senses) and its origin in inference from statistical co-occurrences in the absence of explicit grounding, and on the domain glossary as a corrective: recent literature on large language models in industrial contexts and on structured generation documents the phenomenon and measures the effectiveness of injecting a domain glossary and a data register as methods of reducing drift (studies on hallucination reduction and semantic consistency, 2025–2026). On the register of sources: the notion of provenance (every claim traces back to the source it comes from, verifiable rather than regenerated) is consolidated in the literature on grounding and agent memory. Academic papers and practice reports; the quantitative measures come from individual studies and are to be read as indicative.

The document as an instrument of thought

Slatton, G. (2025). Writing a good design document. grantslatton.com — A practical treatment of the design document as an instrument that adds rigour to reasoning. A professional source, not an academic one.

On the cognitive forcing function in AI-assisted work: recent experimental studies show that obliging explicit engagement with the plan reduces passive acceptance of the output (literature on cognitive forcing functions, arXiv 2026). Initial experimental evidence, still consolidating.

Distinct interlocutors: roles and models

On multi-agent debate and personalities: the literature shows that assigning distinct roles diversifies the perspectives but does not raise performance consistently, and that homogeneous reasoning produces a "mental fixation" despite different personalities (Diverse Multi-Agent Debate and related work, 2024–2026). Academic papers; results dependent on the design of the roles.

On heterogeneous models: research on ensembles and debate between models from different vendors documents complementary biases and failure modes, and the breaking of the single-model team's "echo chamber"; with the caveat that where the failure modes converge, diversity does not help (literature on heterogeneous LLM ensembles and mixed-vendor multi-agent, 2024–2026). Academic papers, some domain-specific.

Cognitive diversity and antidotes to groupthink

Janis, I. L. (1972). Victims of Groupthink. Houghton Mifflin — the original formulation of groupthink and of the devil's advocate as a corrective.

Mason, R. O. (1969). A Dialectical Approach to Strategic Planning. Management Science, 15(8) — dialectical inquiry as a decision structure. Classic, consolidated sources.

Amplifier effect and levelling

An, T. (2026). AI as Equalizer or Amplifier? Task Complexity as the Moderating Factor for Human Expertise in Hybrid Intelligence Systems. arXiv:2512.10961. arxiv.org/abs/2512.10961 — Argues that AI amplifies competence on complex tasks and levels it on simple, well-structured ones. Position paper based on structured observations of a small team, not on a controlled study: to be read as a framing, not as proof. It anchors to the "jagged frontier" of Dell'Acqua et al. (2023).

Convergent empirical evidence on the expert–novice gap in the use of large language models for complex tasks (studies on cybersecurity, laboratory biology, problem reframing, 2024–2026); and contrary evidence of levelling on structured tasks (e.g. assisted scoring). Academic papers; the overall picture depends on the type of task.

Scope, good enough, and over-structuring

Simon, H. A. (1955). A Behavioral Model of Rational Choice. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 69(1) — the original formulation of satisficing and bounded rationality, whereby under constraints of time and information one chooses the first option that clears a threshold of adequacy. A classic source (Simon, Nobel 1978).

Rittel, H. W. J. & Webber, M. M. (1973). Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning. Policy Sciences, 4(2), 155–169 — introduces the distinction between "tame" problems (well-structured, with defined objectives and solution criteria) and "wicked" problems (whose very formulation shifts as they are tackled). The class of structurable problems the method addresses corresponds to the first pole of this distinction. A classic source.

On gold plating, over-engineering and scope creep as documented causes of delays and costs in project management and software development: consolidated nomenclature in the project-management literature; the quantitative estimates on the cost of unused features come from individual industry surveys and are to be read as such, not as consolidated data. On the reverse — contexts in which the pursuit of the optimum (maximizing) pays more than the sufficient — there is evidence in the entrepreneurial domain (studies on decision styles and performance, 2017–2026): the picture depends on the context.

A note on the references

The URLs were verified as of the date of writing. The references without a precise URL point to bodies of literature identified by theme rather than to a single title, so as not to attribute to a single source claims that rest on several convergent works. Where a source is a position paper or a field observation, this is stated: such sources frame and illustrate, they do not prove.

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