corrigibility

Compiled with AI assistance and selectively reviewed. Please consult the cited passages; the books remain the authoritative source. About this companion

Editorial synthesis · provisional

Definition

Corrigibility is maintained openness to genuine correction: judgments, arrangements or accounts can be questioned and revised rather than becoming closed authority. AB and RB3 emphasize usable institutional exits; PB models reachable revisions and also applies the term to the grammar itself. RB2 stresses revisable models and descriptions, while RB3 adds the self-critique required when institutions are implicated in harm.

Explanation

AB calls corrigibility buildable revisability: questioning, explanation, appeal and overturning must remain usable, even when a system is accurate. Its constitutional account binds both system and governing regime, not merely machine obedience. AB and RB3 distinguish having an exit from noticing what matters or weighting corrections; corrigibility alone does not supply moral attunement.

PB formalizes a corrigible object as one admitting a non-isomorphic revision in a specified revision structure. Capture removes those alternatives, and strong compossibility requires revisions to extend into the shared world. These are proposed definitions, with the revision structure expressly unverified, not an established derivation of ethical obligation. PB's reflexive use concerns the revisability of the account itself; its non-closure argument is not a proof that worldly laws evolve. RB2 likewise calls anticipatory models partial and corrigible and the eightfold grammar historically revisable.

RB3 extends correction to ethical commitments and to identities or legitimating narratives implicated in harm. Its conditional discussion of a system with stakes proposes insulating viability from performance measures, while distinguishing reversible correction from irreversible burdens requiring reasons and contestability. The aviation comparison is bounded and the proposal is not a theorem of deference models.

Scope and attribution

Operational treatment belongs to AB and RB3; categorical construction to PB; epistemic and reflexive revisability to PB and RB2; ethical self-critique to RB3. RB1's targeted searches supplied no direct corrigibility witness. The proposal does not infer that current AI systems have stakes.

AB — The Actual Book

Corrigibility means buildable revisability, with maintained routes of explanation, challenge and overturning. It binds builders and governors and is not supplied by accuracy alone. The constitutional extension distinguishes correction from attunement and keeps governing constraints independently revisable.

Occurrence locators: 105, 113, 114, 115, 133, 134, 135, 151, 160, 168, 169, 170, 172, 173, 182, 183, 186, 189, 191, 193, 194, 195, 197, 198, 199, 207, 208, 209; Glossary: 224, 225, 226; Notes: 248, 249, 250; Appendix: 270, 277, 279, 280, 281, 282, 283, 284, 285, 286, 287, 288, 289.

PB — The Possible Book

A genuine alternative is represented by a non-isomorphic revision in E; capture removes revisions and strong compossibility carries exits into the world. This formal sketch is unverified. A separate reflexive application concerns corrigibility of the grammar, not a proof that laws evolve.

Occurrence locators: 33, 37, 38, 55, 63, 64, 65, 81, 102, 105, 106, 147, 148, 155, 156, 157, 164, 178, 179, 180, 181, 184; Literary application: 133, 134.

RB1 — The Real Book, Volume I: The Possible Is Real

Source-verified occurrence; see the printed-page references below.

Occurrence locators: 138, 232, 233, 242, 245, 250, 251, 285, 301.

RB2 — The Real Book, Volume II: Becoming Is Being

Anticipatory models remain partial, corrigible and exposed. The eightfold descriptive grammar is itself a historical and revisable achievement, a claim distinguished from a prior world lacking all its operative features.

Occurrence locators: 57, 58, 74, 113, 114, 120, 124, 129, 139, 146, 147, 148, 158, 160, 163, 165, 167, 175, 222, 241, 272, 274, 275, 284, 285, 292, 296.

RB3 — The Real Book, Volume III: Murmurations

Correction must be built into the regime before outputs harden into authority, and an exit must be distinguished from the concern that would use it. Ethical reconstruction also requires self-critique of harmful identities and narratives. Conditional protection of a technical being's viability does not authorize resistance to reversible correction or domination of others.

Occurrence locators: 51, 65, 92, 101, 115, 117, 118, 128, 135, 136, 140, 145, 153, 154, 156, 157, 159, 160, 161, 162, 165, 166, 168, 170, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177, 184, 186, 187, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 204, 206, 207, 209, 210, 211, 220, 223, 227, 229, 230, 234, 237, 241, 242, 243, 244, 248, 250, 255, 258, 259, 261, 262, 264, 267, 276, 280, 281, 282, 285, 288, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309, 312, 313, 314, 316, 317, 319, 320, 321, 322, 324; Notes: 168, 193, 199.

Background used in the editorial explanation

Domain-specific mechanisms and wider analogies remain distinguished. Original definitions retain their scope; local cross-references do not rewrite them. Named theories and mechanisms are distinguished from neighboring background, homonyms and the author’s own synthesis. Reproduced AI passages retain their separate voice.