2. Links — how they relate
A link connects two records with a typed, directed relation. This is what turns a list of foci into a graph you can reason over.
The syntax is link <from> <relation> <to>:
link truck-is-booked supports conditions-are-fine
link overnight-freeze opposes conditions-are-fine
Read left to right: truck-is-booked supports conditions-are-fine; overnight-freeze
opposes conditions-are-fine. The direction matters — a supports b is not the same as
b supports a.
The relations
There are twelve relations, in three families.
Evidence — the defeasible core. These feed the mirror’s derived confidence and argument status:
| Relation | Meaning |
|---|---|
supports | The source is evidence for the target |
opposes | The source is evidence against the target (a rebuttal) |
undercuts | The source attacks an inference, not the claim itself |
Structural / causal — how things relate in the world or the plan:
| Relation | Meaning |
|---|---|
causes | The source brings about the target |
enables | The source makes the target possible |
prevents | The source stops the target |
depends-on | The target is needed for the source |
blocks | The source holds the target up (see until in chapter 4) |
answers | The source resolves a question |
revises | The source replaces the target (see chapter 6) |
Decision — for expected-value analysis (see the compute layer):
| Relation | Meaning |
|---|---|
leads-to | An option leads to an outcome (carries a probability) |
option-of | An option belongs to a decision |
opposesvs.undercuts.opposesrebuts a node (“that claim is wrong”).undercutsattacks an inference (“that reasoning doesn’t follow”) — its target is usually a link. The distinction matters to the mirror: an undercut weakens a connection rather than the claim. There is deliberately no separaterejectsrelation — a hard rejection is justopposes, and defending X is just attacking X’s attacker.
Aliases and prose
Give a link an alias (its own id) by prefixing name: — useful when you want
to attack the link itself, or reference it later:
link delivery-hypothesis: late-delivery causes set-delayed
The proposed mechanism: evicted hot keys force slow cold reads.
link thermometer-misread undercuts delivery-hypothesis
The indented sentence under a link is its body — prose explaining why the
relation holds. Here thermometer-misread undercuts delivery-hypothesis attacks the
inference by name.
What can a link connect?
A link’s endpoints may be foci, questions, or other links. Pointing a link at a stance or a scope is an error. Pointing it at an id that doesn’t exist is a warning (a dangling reference — usually a typo).
Our document so far
focus conditions-are-fine
kind claim
Conditions on site are fine to pour the slab this afternoon.
focus truck-is-booked
kind observation
The ready-mix truck is booked for 14:00 and the crew is on site.
focus overnight-freeze
kind observation
The thermometer logged minus four degrees overnight.
link truck-is-booked supports conditions-are-fine
link overnight-freeze opposes conditions-are-fine
No more orphans: every focus is connected. Now — who actually believes the claim? That’s a stance.