Research for a more coherent world
Root Sequence is an independent interdisciplinary research initiative exploring how intelligence, technology, and social systems shape one another.
About Root Sequence
About this project.
Root Sequence explores how the systems we build shape what becomes possible next. It looks beyond whether a design achieves its immediate goal to ask how it changes the conditions people depend on.
You can follow work already underway or bring a question of your own.
From research to projects
Some questions lead to community tools or computing designs; others inform Coherent World and No One Noticed . Findings and problems from those projects can feed back into the research. An imagined result in a story is kept separate from evidence that something works.
Why “Root Sequence”?
A root is an underlying condition or relationship from which an outcome grows. A sequence is what happens as conditions interact through time, feedback, choice, and consequence.
Together, the name asks: What conditions made this possible, and what does it make possible next? What happens next can become part of the starting conditions for whatever follows.
Read why the project is called Root Sequence Opens in a new tabContributing across projects
Root Sequence is intended to grow through contributions instead of depending on one person. How decisions and long-term responsibility can be shared is still being developed.
Each project keeps its own permissions and boundaries. Contributing to one does not require agreement with, or responsibility for, the others.
See the research and methodsAn everyday example
A repairable device needs more than screws
Imagine a phone designed so its battery and screen can be replaced. The parts are removable, but replacements are not sold to the public. Repair instructions are restricted, and the software rejects components installed outside an authorized shop.
The device is technically repairable, but the system around it prevents many people from repairing it.
| In the device | The battery and screen can be removed. |
|---|---|
| Around the repair | Parts, instructions, and software access are restricted. |
| For the owner | A possible repair can still be out of reach. |
A repairable design is not necessarily a repairable system.
The hardware, software, instructions, ownership, cost, access, and decision rights are different parts of the same repair problem. Root Sequence would route each part to the fields that can study it properly, then reconnect the findings to understand the whole system.
See the method and concept router Opens in a new tabResearch
Selected research and writing
The work below is still developing. Each entry links to its longer source document on GitHub.
Methods, evidence, and AI use
Root Sequence starts with questions that cross fields. We break them into smaller questions, identify the research and methods that can address each one, and examine how the findings connect.
Differences between fields, competing explanations, and unanswered questions stay visible. Evidence and criticism can change the argument or show that a proposed connection does not hold.
The source notes should let readers follow a claim back to the work supporting it. They should explain how closely we examined the source and where we have gone beyond it to offer an interpretation.
A test we propose is still an idea until it has been run. When reporting results, we describe how they were obtained, including whether anyone else has independently repeated the work. Unresolved questions remain visible after publication.
Rae Lovejoy, who started Root Sequence, uses AI both as an accessibility aid and as a tool for developing Root Sequence. It helps gather connected ideas, organize material, and develop drafts Rae can review in manageable pieces.
Rae contributes motivating questions, conceptual direction, connections across projects, examples, constraints, objections, and revision decisions. AI contributes literature discovery, synthesis, critique, substantial drafting, and some code, including proposed connections and interpretations. Some ideas develop through the exchange.
AI output is not evidence. Sources and reasoning need checking, and a draft does not automatically represent Rae’s endorsement. Review status is recorded alongside the work.
The working paper remains AI-assisted, with author review incomplete and no peer review. Source checking, author approval, independent evaluation, and publication are recorded separately.
Read the research index and evidence guide Opens in a new tab-
Research method
How Root Sequence approaches a question
An idea often begins with a connection between things. This guide helps us work out which fields already study each part and whether their findings support the connection. The idea can change as we learn more, or be set aside if it doesn’t hold up.
This workflow is still developing. Its usefulness across different kinds of research hasn’t been established.
Read the research method Opens in a new tab -
Working paper
Coherence Is a Systems Property
An intelligent system can meet its operator’s goal while creating problems for the people affected by it. This working paper asks what we need to examine beyond that goal, including how the institutions around a system shape what it does.
AI-assisted working draft. Author review is incomplete; it has not been peer reviewed.
Read the working paper Opens in a new tab -
Working framework
Adaptive continuity and dynamic coherence
Earlier changes can shape what a system is able to do next. This working framework explores how it can adapt to changing conditions while preserving or rebuilding its capacity to continue. It also asks whose options a change opens up and whose it closes off.
AI-assisted working synthesis; author review is incomplete. Similarities across fields don’t establish that the same process is at work.
Read the adaptive-continuity framework Opens in a new tab -
Knowledge design
Epistemic discoverability and knowledge routing
Knowledge can be available and still be hard to find when you don’t know what to call it. This design concept explores how to start with your own words and find research relevant to your question. Suggested routes should explain why they might help, so you can decide where to go next.
AI-assisted design proposal; author review is incomplete. Its usefulness for finding research hasn’t been established.
Read the knowledge-routing concept Opens in a new tab -
Design principle
Legible Systems
A system should be straightforward to use, with deeper explanations available when you need them. This design principle explores how that understanding can help you repair a fault or question a decision that affects you, without requiring you to learn the whole system first.
Developing design guidance. Its effects on usability still need evaluation.
Read Legible Systems Opens in a new tab -
Research resource
Reading Trails
Reading Trails keeps track of places worth exploring that turn up during research. The notes explain why a resource might be useful and suggest somewhere to begin. You can follow a question or wander into something you didn’t know to look for.
Developing collection, including AI-assisted starter trails awaiting author review. A resource’s inclusion doesn’t establish support for a claim.
Explore the Reading Trails Opens in a new tab
Other possibilities
What could be different?
Some work begins with a possibility rather than a prediction: another way to travel, share knowledge, use technology, or spend a day.
We don’t need to invent the future from scratch. It was here all along until it was abandoned.
From Abandoned Futures Opens in a new tab
That line starts an investigation. Which ideas were proposed? Why did they stop? What would have to change for another attempt? An attractive proposal still needs scrutiny.
How a possibility becomes an inquiry
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Recover the proposal
Find what was actually proposed, who was involved, what evidence survives, and which conditions made it possible.
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Trace what happened
Distinguish technical failure from political blockage, neglect, enclosure, coordination problems, or a good reason to stop.
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Test it now
Ask who benefits, who carries the work, cost, and risk, what would need to change, and what evidence would count against trying again.
Fiction gives us a place to explore how a different outcome might feel. A scene can raise a question without proving that its imagined solution works.
Explore the connected projectsSelected related projects
Ideas, in different forms.
This is a selected group of projects that share questions while keeping their own purposes, permissions, and decisions. The full project map includes the wider ecosystem.
- Coherent World Speculative design · Private development
- Brings research and design ideas into a possible future to explore how they might affect one another and everyday life. It provides the setting for No One Noticed, while leaving room to explore possibilities beyond the novel.
- No One Noticed Novel in progress · Public site not available yet
- A science-fiction novel about an advanced AI changing the world while much of everyday life still looks familiar. The story follows people living through that transition, often before they understand what is happening.
- Coherent Computing Computing research · No public release
- Explores how computing systems could work around people’s needs and remain understandable and under their control. The work connects operating-system design with what it takes to keep technology useful as people’s circumstances change and devices age.
- Community Infrastructure Practical design · Private development
- Explores how people can find community and organize everyday life together. It develops tools communities could run and shape for themselves, so people can coordinate help while choosing what they share and how they take part.
- Being Human(e): An Incomplete Guide Practical field guide · In development
- A developing field guide to being human and continuing to choose care. It draws on ordinary experience to explore how we relate to one another, including how we set boundaries and take responsibility when we cause harm.
- Museum of Ordinary Life Independent archive · Public website
- Documents everyday life while the people living it can still explain its details. The archive keeps records of ordinary things alongside the context that could help someone understand them years from now.
- Root Sequence Wiki Project reference · Public website
- Helps you find your way around Root Sequence and follow connections between projects. Entries explain recurring terms and point to the fuller work, with notes on where ideas came from and how they have changed.
Take part
Take part in Root Sequence.
Start with something you’d like to explore or help make. There’s room to question the work as well as develop it.
Discuss an idea
Use Root Sequence Discussions to talk through a question or ask where a possible contribution might fit.
Open project discussions Opens in a new tabSuggest a correction
If something seems wrong or is difficult to use, open an issue and tell us where you found it. A short description is enough to start.
Open the issue board Opens in a new tabBoth routes are public and require a GitHub account to post. Keep private or sensitive information out of public posts.
Read the contribution guide Opens in a new tabEach option opens a panel explaining what it is for. Continue to GitHub in a new tab when you’re ready. Nothing is submitted from this page.