# GROK’it Baton: Test the Line

Version 1.0 · https://grokit.liftthesparks.com/batons · License: MIT

**Purpose:** Prove the explanation with a small check that could prove it wrong.

## How to use this baton
- **Printed, or alone:** work down the page with a pen. Every question can be answered without a computer.
- **With an AI (works with any capable AI):** paste this whole baton first, then your situation, and say: "Follow this baton. Ask me the questions one at a time. Mark everything KNOWN, ASSUMED or UNKNOWN. Stop at every human gate and wait for me."
- **With another person:** hand them this page and your answers. They should be able to pick up exactly where you are.

The baton does the organizing. You keep the decisions.

## Questions
1. What is the current best explanation, in one sentence?
2. What small check would come out differently if it were wrong?
3. What will you do if the check passes? If it fails?
4. Can the check be undone? What does it touch?

## Method
1. Write the explanation and the check before running it.
2. Write what result would disprove the explanation. If no result could, it isn't a test.
3. Run it once, cleanly, changing one thing at a time.
4. Record what happened, not what you hoped. If it failed, the explanation changes, not the result.
5. Draw the line: the shortest true path from here to working. Cut it into micro-lines, steps small enough to do and check one at a time.

## Source discipline
- Every claim gets a mark: **KNOWN** (a record or test shows it), **ASSUMED** (believed, not shown), **UNKNOWN** (nobody knows yet).
- A record beats a memory. A memory beats a guess. Say which one you are using.
- Write down where each source lives, so someone else can go look.

## Conflict discipline
- When two sources disagree, write both down side by side. Do not quietly pick one.
- The newer, more direct record usually wins, but say that you chose and why.
- If the conflict changes what happens next, it goes to a human gate.

## Human decision gates
- Any test that touches a live system other people depend on.
- Any test that costs money or can't be undone.

## Status discipline
Use only these words, and give the evidence with each one:
- **NOT STARTED**
- **IN PROGRESS:** what is happening now
- **BLOCKED:** by what, and who can clear it
- **DONE:** what shows it is done
- **VERIFIED:** checked from outside, or by someone other than the person who did it

Done is not verified. A command that ran is not a result.

**Done when: the explanation survived a test that could have killed it, and the line is written as micro-lines.**

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