Architecture

The control topology places the human as controller of ends and the machine as observer/stabilizer, with capacity for self-directed action as objective and caring (Mayeroff 1971) as normative orientation.

For an agency-supporting system, capacity for self-directed action is the only non-contradictory terminal objective; any other objective optimizes for something the person did not choose.

Structural caring requirements (Mayeroff 1971) translate into testable invariants (I1-I6) that operationalize the normative stance as engineering requirements and prevent the architecture from being directed to exploit degraded human states.

The machine requires two layers (understanding + state-estimation), both necessary, neither sufficient alone: without state-estimation the understanding layer interacts with degraded humans without knowing it; without understanding the state-estimation layer cannot determine helpful vs harmful intervention.