declaring-intent

• SKILL.mdcore · 6,315 bytes

# Declaring Intent

## Overview

Before a critical action, say what you intend to do and the reasoning behind it, then act unless someone stops you. The value is that a reviewer can challenge the thinking before the action happens, not the wreckage after. The declaration also forces the actor to make the "why" and the "how will I know" explicit. For an agent, the stated intent is a proposal to be reviewed, never evidence that the agent actually understood.

## Decision contract

- **Claim checked:** the declared intent names a falsifying signal (not just success), carries concrete abort criteria and a checked rollback, and the preconditions are proven rather than assumed before the action runs.
- **Artifact observed:** the intended action and target, the reasoning and precondition evidence, the expected result, and the abort/rollback criteria -> an intent declaration or `intent.md` (action, reasoning, expected result, abort, rollback, decision rights, backup) and the actual-vs-expected result.
- **Decision affected:** block -- whether a reviewer clears the critical or irreversible action before it runs, given expected result, abort criteria, and rollback.
- **Failure class:** unfalsifiable-intent (a stated goal with no falsifying signal, abort threshold, or verified rollback).
- **Next action:** stop when no rollback exists or abort criteria are unmeasurable; get a second reviewer when only one has seen the reasoning.