D.4:2.1 - Develop and compare a continuation

1. Recover the decision and the affected concerns. Use the D.3 account to identify who or what may gain or lose, over which horizon, and why those consequences matter. Check whether the proposed chooser can make the decision in question. Paying for a project, being represented in a survey, being affected by its result and having authority to decide are different relations. Return a consequential missing party to A.1.CSD; return an unresolved value premise to D.1.
2. Separate the end from the proposed means. A valued result can be pursued through means that create another objection. Ask which feature, condition or operation produces that objection and what could supply the valued result without it. B.5.QD.CF develops that question when an assumed necessary means creates the conflict; C.39 supplies construction of another way. Consider continuing the present work, narrowing the change, changing its conditions or refusing it when those are feasible alternatives. A proposed alternative remains a proposal until its required contributions are available.
3. Compare the same alternatives under the live value premises. Preserve each side’s affected participants, consequences, constraints and uncertainty. An encompassing system’s gain does not by itself establish priority over a constituent’s loss. Where different value frames give different orderings, keep those orderings distinct. An alternative that is no worse under every retained ordering and better under at least one can remove a need to trade those values for this choice. This conclusion is limited to the alternatives, premises and affected concerns actually compared. If a trade-off remains, state the priority, compromise or other reason proposed for making it. Authority to choose does not make that reason correct or establish others’ agreement.
4. Resolve only the uncertainty that changes this use. Separate disagreement about consequences from disagreement about which consequences or duties should govern. A causal inquiry can improve the former; it does not by itself settle the latter. Use available support and qualified uncertainty. Where an intended use requires a stronger claim, C.28 or the corresponding subject method supplies its basis; C.11.DUA compares an attainable inquiry with a narrower recommendation, a different option or a stop. Include delay, burden shifted to other parties and displaced work. Preserve a binding requirement’s current force while examining its merits or a feasible revision.
5. Return the supported recommendation or decision. If the comparison basis and available options are settled, C.11 supplies the local choice. If the value conflict remains unresolved, give the conditional alternatives, the missing agreement or authority, or an explicit refusal or impasse. Do not manufacture a common scalar to force a winner. State a residual consequence and a reconsideration condition when they matter to this use. A recommendation does not establish consent, permission or performed work.

Use the same reasoning when the option is advice, publication, a technical change or a change to a method. Identify how its possible use can affect other participants; describing one’s contribution as analysis leaves that question open. The relevant causal and responsibility relations still need their own basis.