Socratic Debate

"The unexamined decision is not worth implementing."

TL;DR

Formal mechanism for resolving ambiguities that have divergent implementation consequences. Runs a structured thesis → antithesis → counter-evidence → synthesis cycle, examines each option against constitutional principles, eliminates by contradiction, and produces a single answer with full rationale. Records debates in .specify/debates/ for auditability. Use when confidence < 0.95, requirements are ambiguous, or trade-offs have no obvious winner. [EXPLICIT]

Procedure

Step 1: Discover

• Identify the ambiguity: what exactly is unclear or contested?
• Classify type: requirements ambiguity, architecture trade-off, priority conflict, or implementation choice
• Gather context: read relevant specs, plans, ADRs, and code
• Identify which constitutional principles (I-XVI) are at stake

Step 2: Analyze

• Frame the thesis: the proposed or default position
• Generate the antithesis: the strongest opposing position
• For each position, identify: supporting evidence, constitutional alignment, risk profile, implementation cost
• Search for counter-evidence via codebase analysis or WebSearch
• Map each option to affected constitutional principles (especially VII, XIV, XV)

Step 3: Execute

• Run elimination by contradiction: which options violate constitutional principles?
• For surviving options, apply weighted scoring: constitutional alignment (40%), implementation simplicity (25%), evidence strength (20%), risk (15%)
• Produce synthesis: the surviving option with full rationale
• Update confidence score (must reach >= 0.95 to close the debate)
• Record debate in .specify/debates/debate-YYYY-MM-DD-topic.md:

  # Debate: {topic}
  Date: {date}
  Trigger: {what caused the debate}
  Thesis: {position A}
  Antithesis: {position B}
  Evidence: {findings}
  Constitutional Alignment: {principle mapping}
  Synthesis: {final answer}
  Confidence: {score}
  Integrated Into: {ADR-NNN / plan / spec reference}
  

Step 4: Validate

• Synthesis resolves the original ambiguity completely
• Confidence >= 0.95 achieved
• All affected parties' concerns addressed or explicitly deprioritized with rationale
• Debate record is linked to the relevant ADR, plan, or spec
• No constitutional principle violated by the synthesis

Quality Criteria

• Ambiguity clearly identified and scoped
• Both thesis and antithesis have evidence support
• Constitutional principles explicitly referenced
• Elimination by contradiction documented
• Synthesis achieves confidence >= 0.95
• Debate record stored in .specify/debates/
• Result integrated into downstream artifact (ADR, plan, spec)
• Evidence tags applied to all claims

Anti-Patterns

Anti-Pattern	Why It's Bad	Do This Instead
Skipping the antithesis	Confirmation bias — you only validate your assumption	Always generate the strongest opposing position
Debating without evidence	Opinions are not decisions	Ground every position in code, config, or documentation
Closing at < 0.95	Unresolved ambiguity propagates downstream	Keep debating or escalate to user
Not recording the debate	Future decisions lose context	Always write to .specify/debates/
Debating trivial choices	Overhead without value	Only debate when implementation consequences diverge

Related Skills

• trade-off-analysis — Weighted decision matrices for architecture choices
• scenario-analysis — Multi-scenario comparison with scoring
• requirements-engineering — When the ambiguity is in requirements, not solutions
• integrity-chain-validation — Debates may reveal integrity chain gaps

Usage

Example invocations:

• "/socratic-debate" — Run the full socratic debate workflow
• "socratic debate on this project" — Apply to current context

Assumptions & Limits

• Assumes access to project artifacts (code, docs, configs) [EXPLICIT]
• Requires English-language output unless otherwise specified [EXPLICIT]
• Does not replace domain expert judgment for final decisions [EXPLICIT]

Edge Cases

Scenario	Handling
Empty or minimal input	Request clarification before proceeding
Conflicting requirements	Flag conflicts explicitly, propose resolution
Out-of-scope request	Redirect to appropriate skill or escalate