Abstractions

Type: kb/types/instruction.md

Make each abstraction in the artifact either earn its place everywhere or give way to the ordinary word everywhere, so that one thing has one name.

Effort: judgment. Whether any sentence needs the distinction the abstraction draws is a claim question, and the decision is per term, not per occurrence.

  1. List each abstraction the artifact uses with the ordinary word it stands in for: retained adaptation → learning, system-definition artifact → instruction file. An abstraction is a term the artifact coins, the KB vocabulary registers, or a linked note defines. Do not apply anything yet.
  2. For each term, read every occurrence and ask whether the ordinary word would change what that sentence claims: by also covering what the abstraction excludes (learning that is not retained), or by losing what it includes (retention no one would call learning). Note each occurrence where it would.
  3. Propose one decision per term:
  4. No occurrence needs the distinction. Replace with the ordinary word throughout. A definition the body then no longer uses is reported as a candidate cut, not removed; search inbound uses first, since a term other artifacts cite this one for stays.
  5. At least one occurrence needs it. Keep the term throughout, including the sentences where the ordinary word would have done. Name the occurrence that decided it. If the term is not defined or linked at its first use, report that for the opening-and-title pass.
  6. The artifact names two things. The abstraction is needed for one thing and the ordinary word names a different one (learning in the training sense next to retained adaptation of a process). Both stay; each occurrence gets the word for the thing it names. Report the pair and the sentence that separates them.
  7. Return the proposals. The operator strikes items. Apply only what survives.

Report: per term, the decision, the deciding occurrence when the term is kept, and the count of replacements.

Preserve: quoted text; a term inside a link title, a filename, or a frontmatter field; the claim of every sentence. A replacement that would widen or narrow a claim is a sign the term is needed, not a reason to reword the claim.