#A.6.3.CR:4.5.f. Local conservativity witness for borderline textual cases

Preface node heading:a-6-3-cr-4-5-f-local-conservativity-witness-for-borderline-textual-cases:9572

#Content

For borderline textual rewrites, a reviewer treats the case as no longer conservative under this pattern unless each point below remains visibly preserved or is explicitly loss-declared with the reroute path stated.

• Modality and force. A rewrite may not silently turn possibility, uncertainty, bounded scope, or hypothesis language into stronger commitment.
• Caveats and qualifications. A rewrite may not quietly remove conditions, exception notes, uncertainty markers, or temporal qualifiers that still matter for reading the same source.
• Reliability posture. Cleaner prose, better ordering, or manager-facing polish may not silently raise confidence, warrant strength, or readiness for action.
• Bridge and substitution burden. Same-entity textual fluency may not import cross-context equivalence, substitution, or comparative-reading licence unless that burden is declared elsewhere.
• Alternative preservation. A rewrite may not collapse open alternatives, rival hypotheses, or declared plurality into one apparently settled reading unless the loss is stated and still lawful under this pattern.

This witness is local to ConservativeRetextualization. It does not replace the broader conservativity laws of A.6.3; it makes them inspectable for textual rewrites where fluent prose can otherwise hide strengthening.