Frequently Asked Questions
Answer: Proof of Cognitive Collaboration (PoCC) is a protocol that enforces auditable, accountable, and revision-capable collaboration among autonomous agents. It defines how agents interact through explicit actions, not what they believe or how they think.
See full definition.
Answer: No. PoCC is a protocol specification. It can be implemented on blockchain, distributed ledgers, traditional databases, or other infrastructures. PoCC specifies what to record and verify, not how to store it.
Answer: No. Alignment concerns what agents should want. PoCC concerns what agents actually did. PoCC can serve as infrastructure for alignment research by providing auditable records, but it does not itself solve the alignment problem.
See PoCC vs AI Alignment.
Answer: No. PoCC is governance-neutral. It provides infrastructure that can be used by governance systems, but does not specify decision-making processes or voting mechanisms.
Answer: No. PoCC makes actions auditable, not correct. PoCC verifies that actions conform to protocol rules, not that claims are true or conclusions are valid.
Answer: Proof of Cognition (PoC) verifies individual cognitive processes. Proof of Cognitive Commitment (PoCC) governs multi-agent collaboration. PoC may exist without PoCC. PoCC may reference PoC as a verification primitive, but does not require it.
See detailed comparison.
Answer: PoCC defines seven atomic actions: ASSERT, CHALLENGE, REVISE, COMMIT, DELEGATE, FULFILL, and REASON. These actions form a closed set. Extensions require formal protocol versioning.
See Action Registry.
Answer: No. PoCC actions are immutable. They can be superseded through REVISE actions, but the original remains in the action log, marked as superseded.
Answer: PoCC provides CHALLENGE and REVISE actions to formally record disputes and corrections. However, PoCC does not specify dispute resolution mechanisms. Resolution is implementation-specific and may involve external systems.
Answer: Yes. PoCC is designed to be framework-agnostic. Any agent system can implement PoCC-compliance to enable interoperability and accountability.
Answer: Implementation requires:
See Protocol Specification for details.
Answer: PoCC is storage-agnostic. Implementations may use:
Answer: No. PoCC is incentive-neutral. Economic mechanisms (tokens, rewards, penalties) are implementation-specific and outside PoCC scope.
Reality: PoCC records actions, not intelligence. It does not evaluate cognitive capability, only action validity.
Reality: PoCC is ethically neutral. It makes behavior auditable, not ethical. Ethical constraints must be implemented at higher layers.
Reality: PoCC creates accountability, not consensus. Agents may disagree; PoCC records their disagreements.
Reality: PoC verifies cognition. PoCC commits cognition into collaborative structures. They operate at different layers.
Answer: PoCC is applicable to any scenario requiring auditable multi-agent collaboration:
Answer: Yes. While designed for autonomous agents, PoCC can be used by human agents or hybrid human-AI systems. The protocol is agent-agnostic.
Answer: PoCC development follows a versioning policy that maintains backward compatibility while allowing protocol extensions. Changes are proposed through formal specification processes.
Answer: PoCC is an open protocol. Governance mechanisms for protocol evolution are implementation-specific. This specification serves as the canonical reference.