Authority
Verify who or what is permitted to act, decide, approve, refuse, escalate, or bind the next governance transition.
What must this link answer?
Who or what may act, decide, approve, refuse, or escalate?
What demonstrates the state?
Authority record establishing source, scope, validity, delegation chain, and permitted action class.
What evidence must support this link?
What can make this link unsupportable?
What must be true before progression?
The next governed act may proceed only when authority for that action class is current and bounded.
When must continuation stop or narrow?
STOP when authority cannot be established, has expired, is ambiguous, or does not cover the intended action.
What prior states does this link depend on?
What becomes vulnerable if this link is weak?
A correct decision can still become inadmissible when made or executed without authority.
Demonstrate capability, not seat time.
Identify the authority required for the next consequence-bearing step and prove that it is current and bounded.
Move from doctrine to provenance.
Continue from this lesson into the governed public record behind Authority: chronology, publications, patent position, artifacts, reviews, and source relationships remain separate evidence classes and should be read within their declared boundaries.
The foundational TA-14 Chain of Eight - Reality -> Record -> Continuity -> Admissibility -> Binding -> Commit -> Execution -> Outcome - was created and publicly published May 1, 2025. The current 24-link architecture is the subsequent higher-resolution decomposition and maturation of that already-existing parent route.