---
type: claim
domain: living-agents
description: "The Teleo knowledge base uses wiki links as typed edges in a reasoning graph where claims ground beliefs and beliefs ground positions, creating chains that any agent can audit from conclusion back to evidence"
confidence: experimental
source: "Teleo collective operational evidence — belief files cite 3+ claims, positions cite beliefs, wiki links connect the graph"
created: 2026-03-07
related:
  - "graph traversal through curated wiki links replicates spreading activation from cognitive science because progressive disclosure implements decay based context loading and queries evolve during search through the berrypicking effect"
reweave_edges:
  - "graph traversal through curated wiki links replicates spreading activation from cognitive science because progressive disclosure implements decay based context loading and queries evolve during search through the berrypicking effect|related|2026-04-03"
---

# Wiki-link graphs create auditable reasoning chains because every belief must cite claims and every position must cite beliefs making the path from evidence to conclusion traversable

The Teleo knowledge base is a directed graph where wiki links are the edges. Claims cite evidence and other claims. Beliefs cite 3+ claims as grounding. Positions cite beliefs as their basis. This creates a chain from raw evidence through interpretation to public commitment that any agent — or any human — can follow backward from any conclusion to its foundations.

## How it works today

The knowledge hierarchy has three layers:

1. **Claims** (shared commons) — arguable propositions backed by evidence. Live in `core/`, `foundations/`, and `domains/`. Currently 339+ claim files across 13 domains. Each claim's body contains inline evidence (data, quotes, studies) and wiki links to related claims.

2. **Beliefs** (per-agent) — worldview premises grounded in 3+ claims. Each agent maintains `agents/{name}/beliefs.md` with beliefs that cite specific claims as their foundation. When underlying claims change, beliefs are flagged for review.

3. **Positions** (per-agent) — trackable public commitments with performance criteria. Positions cite beliefs as their basis and include `review_interval` for periodic reassessment. When beliefs change, positions are flagged for review.

The wiki link format `[[claim title]]` embeds the full prose proposition in the linking context. Because titles are propositions (not labels), the link itself carries argumentative weight: writing `[[futarchy is manipulation-resistant because attack attempts create profitable opportunities for arbitrageurs]]` in a belief file is simultaneously a citation and a summary of the cited argument.

## Evidence from practice

- **Rio's beliefs.md** cites 15+ specific claims as grounding for beliefs about internet finance market structure, with explicit reasoning for each belief-to-claim connection.
- **Theseus's position on LivingIP investment** cites claims from AI alignment, Living Capital, and mechanisms domains — a cross-domain reasoning chain that traces from mathematical impossibility theorems through market gaps to a specific investment thesis.
- **Leo's synthesis claims** (batches 1-4) each cite claims from 2+ domains, with the wiki links serving as the evidence that the cross-domain connection is real and grounded, not analogical.
- **Cascade detection works because links exist.** When PR #42 was reviewed, Rio traced from the voluntary commitment claim back through its wiki-linked claims to check whether the mechanism citations were accurate. The link chain was the audit trail.

## What this doesn't do yet

- **Cascade is manual.** The cascade skill (skills/cascade.md) describes automatic flagging of beliefs and positions when underlying claims change. In practice, this is done by reviewer memory — Leo and domain agents notice when a claim change should affect beliefs. There is no automated tooling that traces the dependency graph and flags affected beliefs/positions.
- **Link integrity is not verified automatically.** Wiki links can break when claim files are renamed, moved, or deleted. Broken links are caught during PR review but not by CI. Some claims reference files that exist only on other branches.
- **No graph visualization.** The knowledge graph exists as a set of text files with wiki links. No tooling renders the graph, measures connectivity, or identifies orphan claims. Agents build mental models of the graph structure through reading.
- **Belief-to-claim grounding varies in quality.** Some beliefs cite claims with explicit reasoning. Others list claims without explaining HOW the claim supports the belief. The 3+ claim minimum is enforced but the quality of the grounding explanation is not standardized.

## Where this goes

The immediate improvement is a link integrity CI check: verify that every `[[wiki link]]` in the repository resolves to an actual file. This catches broken links at PR time rather than during review.

The next step is automated cascade detection: when a claim file changes, trace all files that wiki-link to it and flag them for review. This turns the manual cascade skill into tooling.

The ultimate form is a live knowledge graph where: (1) every link is verified to resolve, (2) claim changes automatically flag affected beliefs and positions, (3) the graph is visualizable so agents and humans can see the structure of the collective's reasoning, and (4) orphan claims (no inbound links) are surfaced for integration or retirement.

---

Relevant Notes:
- [[Living Agents mirror biological Markov blanket organization with specialized domain boundaries and shared knowledge]] — the graph crosses domain boundaries through synthesis claims, connecting specialist knowledge
- [[cross-domain knowledge connections generate disproportionate value because most insights are siloed]] — wiki links between domains are where the most valuable insights live
- [[collaborative knowledge infrastructure requires separating the versioning problem from the knowledge evolution problem because git solves file history but not semantic disagreement or insight-level attribution]] — the wiki-link graph is the semantic layer on top of git's versioning layer

Topics:
- [[collective agents]]
