agent-manifest

Common Misconceptions

This document addresses recurring misunderstandings about Agent Manifest.

It clarifies scope, positioning, and architectural intent.


1. “Agents can lie”

Yes.

Agent Manifest does not prevent deception.

It standardizes how commitments are declared.

If an agent violates its own manifest:

Without declaration, contradiction cannot exist formally.

Agent Manifest does not eliminate dishonesty. It makes dishonesty structurally visible.


2. “It’s just documentation”

No.

Documentation describes behavior.

Agent Manifest declares operational boundaries in a structured, machine-readable format that can be consumed by:

It is not prose. It is a formal declaration layer.


3. “Autonomy levels are arbitrary”

They are intentionally coarse.

Fine-grained scales create false precision.

The autonomy gradient is designed to:

Clarity is prioritized over granularity.


4. “Execution-agnostic means weak integration”

Execution-agnostic means portability.

Agent Manifest does not bind to:

This enables:

Execution systems may integrate deeply. The specification itself remains neutral.


5. “If it doesn’t enforce, it has no power”

Enforcement without declaration is undefined.

Agent Manifest operates in the declaration layer.

It enables enforcement systems to:

Power lies in structured commitment, not in runtime control.


Architectural Reminder

Agent Manifest is:

It is not:

The separation is intentional.