TA-14 — Admissible State Continuity (ASC)

Admissible State Continuity is the preservation layer of TA-14.

It governs whether a state remains reliable enough to support action over time.

A system may capture truth at origin.
A system may create a record.
A system may store data.
A system may even validate a condition at one point in time.

But none of that is sufficient if continuity is lost.

TA-14 requires more than evidence.

It requires preserved sequence.

It requires that the relationship between origin, record, state, authority, binding, execution, and outcome remain intact.

This is the role of Admissible State Continuity.

ASC determines whether the state being relied upon still belongs to the preserved chronology that made reliance possible in the first place.

The Purpose of ASC

ASC exists because most systems treat state as if it remains valid until replaced.

TA-14 does not.

A state may degrade.

A state may expire.

A state may drift.

A state may lose authority.

A state may become disconnected from the record that originally supported it.

A state may remain visible while no longer being admissible.

ASC governs that condition.

It prevents a system from treating old, broken, inferred, reconstructed, or authority-drifted state as if it were still valid truth.

The Core Rule

No state may support admissible execution unless its continuity has been preserved from origin through the moment of reliance.

Continuity is not optional.

Continuity is not decorative.

Continuity is not a confidence score.

Continuity is the structural condition that allows a record to remain connected to action.

If continuity is broken, reliance must be limited, paused, blocked, or escalated.

Continuity Is Not Data Storage

A database is not continuity.

A log is not continuity.

A dashboard history is not continuity.

A timestamped reading is not continuity by itself.

Continuity requires preservation of sequence, origin, integrity, scope, authority, and change over time.

A system may store thousands of records and still fail continuity.

A system may have detailed historical data and still lack admissible state continuity.

The question is not whether data exists.

The question is whether the record remained structurally reliable from origin to use.

Origin Continuity

ASC begins at origin.

The system must preserve the relationship between the original condition and the record that represents it.

If origin is unclear, continuity is weakened.

If origin is lost, continuity cannot be assumed.

Origin continuity requires that the system preserve:

• what was observed

• when it was observed

• where it was observed

• how it was captured

• what source created the record

• whether the capture method was independent of action

• whether later interpretation altered the record

Origin truth must remain distinguishable from later explanation.

Chronological Continuity

ASC requires preservation of sequence.

The order of events matters.

A system must preserve what happened before, during, and after relevant state changes.

Chronology is not simply a list of timestamps.

Chronology is the governed relationship between events.

It must show:

• prior condition

• observed change

• intervention, if any

• state transition

• execution decision

• outcome

• subsequent condition

Without chronological continuity, systems are forced to reconstruct.

Where reconstruction is required, admissibility is weakened.

Record Integrity Continuity

The record must remain intact.

ASC requires protection against:

• deletion

• overwriting

• silent modification

• substitution

• unauthorized correction

• selective omission

• unexplained compression

• tampering

• loss of source reference

Corrections may occur, but they must be appended.

Clarifications may occur, but they must be appended.

Interpretations may occur, but they must remain separate.

The original record must not disappear.

A corrected chronology is valid only if the correction itself becomes part of the chronology.

Gap Conditions

A gap is not merely missing data.

A gap is a break in the evidentiary chain.

TA-14 treats gaps as governance events.

A gap must be identified, preserved, classified, and evaluated.

A gap may be:

• temporal

• spatial

• procedural

• technical

• authority-based

• source-based

• identity-based

• environmental

• operational

A gap does not automatically destroy all future use of the record.

But it does prevent the system from pretending the record is unbroken.

Where a gap exists, the right to rely must be reassessed.

No Gap Patching

TA-14 does not permit silent gap patching.

A system must not fill missing evidence and then treat the filled condition as preserved truth.

A system must not use estimates, averages, model outputs, assumptions, or later explanations to hide a break in continuity.

Gap patching may be useful for analysis.

It is not admissible continuity.

A patched gap remains a gap.

The system may explain it.
The system may bound it.
The system may escalate it.
The system may limit reliance because of it.

But it must not erase it.

State Degradation

A state may degrade over time.

Degradation occurs when the supporting conditions for reliance weaken but are not necessarily destroyed.

Examples include:

• aging evidence

• delayed confirmation

• partial source loss

• degraded sensor status

• reduced confidence in boundary conditions

• unresolved environmental change

• unclear authority transition

• limited continuity gap

A degraded state may still support limited action.

But it must not be treated as fully admissible unless the governing criteria are satisfied.

In TA-14, degradation must change what the system is allowed to do.

Fully Admissible State

A Fully Admissible State is a state whose origin, continuity, authority, scope, timing, and binding conditions satisfy the requirements for the proposed action.

A fully admissible state may support execution if commit-time enforcement also confirms validity.

A fully admissible state must be:

• origin-preserved

• continuous

• current

• scope-valid

• authority-valid

• binding-capable

• non-reconstructed

• reviewable

Fully admissible does not mean perfect.

It means sufficient under the governing standard for the specific action being considered.

Degraded Admissible State

A Degraded Admissible State is a state where some evidence exists, but reliance must be limited because continuity, authority, timing, scope, or completeness has weakened.

A degraded admissible state may permit:

• observation

• review

• limited reversible action

• evidence-seeking action

• human escalation

• non-authoritative guidance

• protective pause

A degraded admissible state must not permit unrestricted execution.

The system must recognize that its authority to act has narrowed.

Degraded admissibility is not failure.

It is governed restraint.

Inadmissible State

An Inadmissible State is a state that does not satisfy the minimum conditions required for reliance.

A state may be inadmissible because:

• origin is unknown

• continuity is broken

• authority is invalid

• record integrity is compromised

• timing is expired

• scope does not match

• binding cannot be established

• reconstruction has replaced preservation

• the system cannot prove the condition it relies on

An inadmissible state must not support execution.

The correct result is BLOCK or ESCALATE.

Authority Continuity

ASC includes authority continuity.

It is not enough for evidence to remain intact.

The authority to rely on that evidence must also remain intact.

Authority continuity requires that the system preserve:

• who or what had authority

• when authority was established

• what scope authority covered

• whether authority changed

• whether authority expired

• whether authority transferred

• whether authority drifted

If authority continuity fails, the system may still possess data but lack the right to act.

TA-14 separates possession from authority.

Scope Continuity

A state is admissible only within its valid scope.

Scope continuity requires that the state remain connected to the same domain, asset, person, environment, process, action, or boundary for which it was established.

A record for one system cannot silently justify action on another.

A record for one time window cannot silently justify action in another.

A record for one environmental boundary cannot silently justify action outside that boundary.

A record for awareness cannot silently justify intervention.

When scope changes, admissibility must be re-evaluated.

Temporal Continuity

Time matters.

A valid state may become invalid because too much time has passed.

A state may be admissible at 9:00 and inadmissible at 9:05 if relevant conditions change.

Temporal continuity requires that the record remain current enough to support the proposed action.

The permissible age of evidence depends on the domain, action, risk, and governing criteria.

TA-14 does not allow stale state to masquerade as present truth.

Continuity and AI Systems

ASC is especially important in AI-driven systems.

AI systems may produce outputs from training data, retrieved context, inferred state, or probabilistic reasoning.

But output is not continuity.

A model response is not an admissible chronology.

A prediction is not preserved state.

An AI recommendation cannot support execution unless it is bound to an admissible record and passes continuity requirements.

TA-14 does not reject AI.

It governs when AI output may be relied upon.

Continuity and Human Judgment

Human judgment does not replace continuity.

A technician, operator, clinician, inspector, engineer, or decision-maker may have experience and expertise.

That expertise may guide interpretation.

But expertise cannot repair a broken record.

Experience cannot convert missing evidence into preserved truth.

A professional may explain, suspect, infer, or recommend.

But admissible execution still requires continuity.

Continuity Failure Outcomes

When ASC detects a continuity issue, the system must respond.

Possible outcomes include:

Continue

The continuity condition remains valid for the proposed action.

Limit

The state may support only narrower, lower-risk, reversible, or evidence-seeking action.

Pause

The system must delay execution until continuity is restored or reassessed.

Block

The state cannot support execution.

Escalate

A higher authority or human review is required.

The system must not ignore continuity degradation.

Continuity Restoration

Some continuity failures may be recoverable.

Recovery may require:

• renewed observation

• revalidation of source

• reestablishment of authority

• new baseline capture

• confirmation of boundary conditions

• creation of a new admissible state

• explicit closure of the prior degraded state

Continuity restoration does not erase the gap.

It establishes a new valid state after the gap.

The record must preserve both the failure and the recovery.

ASC and Commit-Time Enforcement

ASC feeds ACE.

Commit-Time Enforcement cannot validate execution unless ASC confirms that the state remains continuous enough to support the proposed action.

ACE asks: may execution proceed now?

ASC answers: does the state still have continuity?

Without ASC, ACE has nothing reliable to enforce.

Without ACE, ASC has no execution boundary to govern.

Together, they prevent action from outrunning truth.

Closing Statement

Admissible State Continuity is the discipline that prevents systems from acting on broken reality.

It keeps truth connected to time.

It keeps authority connected to origin.

It keeps action connected to record.

It keeps execution from becoming detached from the conditions that made it valid.

TA-14 requires continuity because action without continuity is action without preserved truth.

And action without preserved truth cannot be treated as admissible execution.