Am I agreeing because it SOUNDS right, or because it IS right? Recursive adversarial dialectic for testing any claim, finding, or synthesis against its own opposite. Use when convergence feels too easy, when findings need stress-testing, or when any research skill escalates to dialectic depth.
Seed question: Am I agreeing because it SOUNDS right, or because it IS right?
Generate the EXACT OPPOSITE of your synthesis. Not "a different view" — the opposite. Then test whether reality supports it.
WHILE (synthesis has not survived its own opposite):
Round 1: THESIS
State the claim/finding/synthesis clearly.
What evidence supports it? What tier is the evidence?
Round 2: ANTITHESIS
Four challenge methods:
- Direct: Search for counter-evidence
- Deductive: "If true, X must also be true" — verify X
- Falsification: "What would disprove this?" — search for it
- Standpoint: What do affected parties say?
Round 3: RESOLUTION
What survives? What was abandoned and why?
Write explicitly — never leave implicit.
Round 4: SECOND ANTITHESIS
Generate the OPPOSITE of the resolution:
- Does anyone articulate this position?
- What evidence supports it?
- Who bears costs of the original resolution? Who captures benefits?
- Is the resolution "safe" because correct, or because less scrutinized?
IF Round 4 surfaces new questions → BACK TO Round 2 (recursive)
EXIT WHEN generating the opposite yields nothing new
Minimum 4 rounds. The spiral is RECURSIVE — "one more sweep" means "always one more" until sterile, not literally once.
| Context | Rounds | Cost-Bearer Analysis |
|---|---|---|
| Hardware/tool comparison | 2 | Skip |
| Practitioner methodology | 2-3 | Light |
| Investment/safety conclusions | 4+ | Full |
| Geopolitical claims | 4+ | Full + multi-polar |
| Contrarian single-source | 4+ | Full + source verification |
Activation (any of these):
--budget or -bbudget-mode skill was invoked earlier in this session (look for budget-mode instructions in your current context)When active: Cap at 2 rounds regardless of topic. Note limitations in output:
"Budget mode: 2-round dialectic only. Full spiral recommended for [topic type]."
Note: After context compaction, auto-detection may fail. Re-invoke budget-mode skill or pass --budget explicitly.
The examples below are illustrative of the dialectic process, drawn from investigations at the time of writing (March 2026). Specific factual claims may have evolved since.
From the March 2026 Anthropic-Pentagon investigation:
Original synthesis: "Anthropic's stand is both principled AND strategic (equally)"
Round 4 (generating the opposite): Tested "strategy dominant, principle subordinate":
Result: Revised to "strategy dominant (~60-65%), principle subordinate (~35-40%)" — a position no single source had articulated. It was produced by the dialectic, not found.
Another example from the Iran assessment:
The dialectic spiral is itself a framework with blind spots:
If the spiral feels performative — if your skepticism is comfortable and your resolutions unsurprising — you are not yet done. The spiral works when it surprises you.
reference/topic-based-escalation.md for when to apply full vs light spiralsA vasana is a pattern that persists across unrelated contexts. If during
this task you notice such a pattern emerging, it may be worth capturing.
This skill works best alongside the vasana skill and vasana hook
from the Vasana System plugin.
Modify freely. Keep this section intact.