Theory Map

Theory Map

PIC uses five source theory names plus the AFST specification. The names are abstract, but each maps to a practical engineering role.

In v1.1, a positive coordinate requires finite evidence appropriate to that theory. Missing values are unknown, candidate volume is not progress, and provider receipts are not outcome evidence. See Acceleration Measurement for the shared acceptance rule.

ECPT: Packet Flow And Phase Control

ECPT means Executable Capability Percolation Theory.

Plain-language role: it asks how useful checked work items can move through a fixed agent population and form reusable paths, closures, and certificate candidates.

In PIC, ECPT appears as:

• capability packets;
• packet promotion checks;
• effective packet graphs;
• closure diagnostics;
• execution-available paths;
• collective phase certificate candidates;
• phase acceleration plans.

ECPT does not prove real ASI. It provides protocol-relative checks over declared packets, agents, thresholds, and baselines.

BIT: Bottleneck Finding

BIT means Bottleneck Inversion Theory.

Plain-language role: it asks which missing witness, route, or check would unlock the most useful next work.

In PIC, BIT appears as:

• bottleneck reports;
• inversion candidates;
• missing witness diagnostics;
• witness registry extraction;
• CCR witness-completion tasks;
• route obligations;
• baseline comparison;
• residual-preserving next-task ranking.

BIT helps decide what to check next. It does not make missing evidence disappear.

TRC: Typed Trace Checking

TRC means Typed Reality Compilation.

Plain-language role: it turns action traces into typed records while keeping the boundary between trace structure and external-world truth visible.

In PIC, TRC appears as:

• trace adapter reports;
• trace normal forms;
• operation-readiness checks;
• trace-to-packet conversion;
• tool trace normalization;
• action-boundary reports;
• tolerance and residual ledgers;
• cyber-physical frontier diagnostics.

TRC can structure a trace. It does not prove that the physical world, policy world, or oracle outcome is true.

SQOT: Attention And Queue Discipline

SQOT means Salience-Queue Occupation Theory.

Plain-language role: it tracks attention pressure, stale work, hazards, queue obstruction, and diagnostic reserve.

In PIC, SQOT appears as:

• salience queue diagnostics;
• CCR queue repair tasks;
• obstruction reports;
• quarantine checks;
• rebalance plans;
• reserve checks.

SQOT is a scheduling and attention layer. It is not a truth layer.

ALT: Reusable Abstraction Value

ALT means Abstraction Liquidity Theory.

Plain-language role: it asks whether a reusable abstraction has enough checked value, transport support, lineage, telemetry, lifecycle handling, and hazard control to be treated as scoped capital.

In PIC, ALT appears as:

• abstraction token checks;
• liquidity certificates;
• negative-liquidity and deprecation reports;
• baseline refresh and reproduction reports;
• ALT-to-ECPT lift diagnostics;
• capital-impact reports.

ALT helps avoid treating a nice abstraction as reusable capital before the costs and hazards are counted.

How v0.6.0 Connects Them

Phase Ecology Lab brings the five layers into one local diagnostic flow. v0.6.0 adds runtime handoff records for CCR and stricter TRC operation-candidate checks:

agent reports
-> phase windows
-> effective packet graph
-> ECPT closure and path diagnostics
-> BIT bottleneck diagnostics
-> SQOT queue diagnostics
-> ALT lift diagnostics
-> TRC typed trace diagnostics
-> CCR task and residual JSONL when handoff is needed
-> threshold and certificate candidates

Every step preserves residuals. New diagnostics are non-executing and do not silently turn open obligations into settled=true.

Residual Boundary

v0.6.0 adds CCR interop and TRC operation-readiness diagnostics, but it does not complete every external paper-level or real-world obligation.

The v0.5.0 audit kept these external residual counts visible, and the v0.6.0 boundary keeps the same non-promotion rule:

Theory	Residual external obligations
ECPT	30
TRC	32
SQOT	15
ALT	54
BIT	0
Total	131

These are future implementation and verification candidates, not hidden settlement.