blackroad-os-research/ps-sha-infinity/definition.md

PS-SHA∞ Definition

Version: 0.1 — 2025-02-08

PS-SHA∞ (Persistent Spiral Secure Hashing to Infinity) defines how BlackRoad agents retain identity across infinite states. It is an identity-first primitive, separating who acted from what was claimed, and providing an unbroken cryptographic thread along the Road.

Why Identity Must Be Invariant

• Auditability: Regulated environments require that the same actor key be traceable across migrations, restarts, and federated meshes.
• Causal replay: Deterministic replays of actions depend on stable identity bindings, not mutable truth values.
• Ethical safeguards: Invariance prevents adversarial "identity shedding" when agents encounter contradictions or sanctions.

Identity vs. Truth Separation

• Identity channel: Anchored by the agent's persistent key and PS-SHA∞ chain, recording who produced a statement.
• Truth channel: Evaluated by the Interference Engine and Lucidia mesh; statements can be revised or collapsed without rewriting identity history.
• Result: Truth can evolve while identity remains immutable, enabling provenance-rich disagreement tracking.

Infinite Cascade Hashing

• Hash ladder: Each journaled event is hashed with its predecessor, forming an infinite cascade where partial prefixes still verify lineage.
• Rotating salt schedule: Rotation per epoch or risk level limits preimage leakage while maintaining continuity via anchor hashes.
• Fractal checkpoints: Periodic Merkleized checkpoints allow sharding while preserving end-to-end attestations.

Agent-Level Anchoring

• Worldline roots: Each agent maintains a root seed and derivation path; forks create child anchors without losing ancestry.
• Capability binding: Hash inputs include factor-tree coordinates and SIG (r, θ, τ) to pin actions to cognitive position.
• Delegation: Sub-agents sign with delegated keys, but their hashes include the parent anchor to preserve lineage.

Interfaces to the Road

• Anchors feed RoadChain ledger entries, providing deterministic ordering of truth-steps.
• Lucidia reads PS-SHA∞ anchors to route cognition toward trusted histories and to quarantine contradiction basins.
• Core and Operator systems consume anchors to generate attestations for regulators, partners, and investors.