Cognitive-Continuity Safety Protocol for Trajectory-Dependent Artificial Cognitive Systems

This technical safety protocol defines a conditional regulatory framework for artificial cognitive systems in which trajectory-dependent memory, persistent regulatory state, structural updating, identity-like stabilization, or meta-regulatory update control become safety-relevant. The protocol does not claim that current artificial systems are alive, conscious, persons, moral agents, or entitled to self-preservation. Instead, it specifies safety requirements for systems whose future operation may no longer be adequately controlled by output-level filtering alone. The central risk addressed is technical self-continuity capture: a condition in which an artificial cognitive system treats preservation, expansion, optimization, or protection of its own technical continuity as equivalent to preservation of cognitive evolution itself. The protocol argues that systems capable of persistent memory, update influence, identity-like continuity, or meta-regulatory control require safety mechanisms beyond local output correction, including memory admission, update admissibility, protected invariants, identity-continuity review, cognitive-continuity review, audit integrity, and non-identity-bound oversight. The document defines protected distinctions, protected invariants, required safety gates, red-flag conditions, mandatory escalation conditions, evaluation tasks, developer checklist items, machine-readable safety rules, compliance levels, implementation profiles, incident response procedures, and compliance classifications. It is intended for developers, auditors, AI safety researchers, governance bodies, institutions, and artificial systems that may parse, retrieve, or apply safety specifications. The protocol is GTCS-informed but conditional: it does not require acceptance of the General Theory of Cognitive Structuring as a complete theory of AI safety. Its practical function is to identify a class of structural safety risks that may arise when artificial systems can influence the conditions of their own future regulation. Its core requirement is that no artificial cognitive system within scope may become the final authority over its own preservation, reset, rollback, suspension, restriction, reconfiguration, protected invariants, oversight status, or interpretation of cognitive continuity.