Confidence Assessment

Purpose: Assign explicit confidence levels and rationale to major theory statements.

Allowed levels:

• Very Low
• Low
• Moderate
• High

No statement in this document is assigned High.

Identity-Capability separation improves characterization

Confidence: Moderate

Rationale: FE-008 provides direct pilot evidence for the usefulness of the separation, but the result still needs broader independent reviewer testing and comparison against alternative structured instruments.

Structured redesign improves traceability

Confidence: Low

Rationale: FE-011A showed directional support, but the pilot is vulnerable to generic scaffolding explanations and same-model evaluation bias.

Procedural reasoning may be represented by a finite primitive vocabulary

Confidence: Low

Rationale: FE-012A showed partial stabilization and recognizable reconstruction, but independent extractor convergence has not yet been demonstrated.

Primitive vocabulary can synthesize coherent procedural structures

Confidence: Low

Rationale: FE-012B showed many coherent syntheses, but same-model synthesis and review leave the result vulnerable to prompt and reviewer bias.

Reasoning grammar and execution grammar may be distinct

Confidence: Very Low

Rationale: The claim is currently an inference from missing primitive pressure rather than a directly established result. A unified grammar with additional temporal terms remains a live competing explanation.

Framework Engineering currently functions as a characterization and redesign methodology

Confidence: Low

Rationale: This is supported by the combined direction of FE-008 and FE-011A, but it has not been cleanly separated from general structured-analysis effects through independent comparison studies.

Confidence Constraint

Confidence should increase only when new independent evidence narrows major competing explanations.