Independent Research Journal

Research on coherent agency under constraint across human and artificial systems.

Independent research project

Alignment Theory

Alignment Theory studies how adaptive systems preserve coherent agency under constraint.

Healthy systems preserve the capacities required for meaningful participation, judgment, adaptation, refusal, responsibility, and action. Support can strengthen those capacities or substitute for them. Constraints can preserve usable agency or capture it. Authority determines who may legitimately bind action, and continuity determines whether meaning and authority survive handoffs over time.

Support versus substitution remains a central mechanism within this broader theory. The design problem is how to prevent capability, speed, and scale from outrunning the coherence required to govern them.

Working conceptual and design framework by Michael Nathan Bower. Canonical synthesis updated September 14, 2026; not peer reviewed.

Understand the theory The current conceptual center and revised framework notes. Explore the research Papers, stress tests, AI alignment work, and the preserved archive. Follow AI governance work Behavioral drift, PCPI, Agent Action Gate, and runtime governance.

Applied work

Applied work

Alignment Theory is the foundation. HAPI applies it to human and institutional agency. AGS applies it to delegated AI action under human or organizational authority.

Human Agency Preservation Infrastructure

The human and institutional application: usable agency, legitimate constraints, meaningful refusal, and restoration of capacity over time.

Open HAPI overview

Alignment Governance Stack

The implementation-facing application: keeping delegated action continuous with authorization through execution, evidence, and memory.

Open AGS overview

The original Agent Action Gate prototype remains available as part of the project history.

Notes

Newsletter layer in preparation

The notes layer will hold dated updates, short research observations, and work-in-progress framing. The new Notes index records the planned route pattern and links back to the existing essay archive.

Open Notes

Selected research

Current places to begin

Revised Framework Center

The main conceptual hub for the current formulation.

Open theory hub

Stress Tests

Cross-domain tests for support, substitution, capacity, and collapse.

Open stress tests

AI Alignment Research

Behavioral drift research and proposed governance methods for AI systems.

Open AI research

PCPI

A measurement layer for whether AI help preserves human participation.

Open PCPI

Archive

Earlier pages remain available

Older formulations are kept live for provenance. The archive is useful for tracing how the work developed, but it should not compete with the current reading path.

Open the archive