RMP.2:5 - Archetypal Grounding

All cases below are constructed pedagogical cases. Their supplied values distinguish the four dispositions; they do not report actual pump, stream, archive, instrument, or authority results.

RMP.2:5.1 - Accelerated Seal-Test: Different Supplied Values

The supplied ResearchQuestionBrief asks whether a high-temperature acceleration condition preserves the field failure-mechanism relation well enough for degradation evidence to bear on the current Pump-P4 seal-life claim. Research does not choose the maintenance interval.

Compare the following relations when their supplied conditions make them serious:

EvidenceSufficientStop scenario. A newly supplied current result already shows, with compatible materials and operating envelope, that the proposed acceleration condition changes the dominant degradation mechanism. The answer condition is met by the supported rejection of that test condition’s relevance. RMP.2 returns the exact result, limitations, and reopen condition; it does not run an experiment to confirm an answer already sufficient for this use.

ResearchDesignDecision scenario. Domain engineering supplies the mechanism-indicator relation, measurement feasibility, material identity, safe operating envelope, and authority needed for the experimental comparison. The field and model options remain useful secondary evidence but cannot expose acceleration-induced mechanism change as directly within the current constraints. RMP.2 selects the experimental/quantitative family with that core comparison and criticism. PostSelectionNeed contains only the repository locator and serialization of already-required specimen, condition, observation, and deviation fields. The admissible choices change neither family nor criticism; an inability to record any required field falls outside the admitted range and reopens selection.

ResearchDesignHold scenario. The measurement owner has not established whether the proposed indicator distinguishes the two rival degradation mechanisms. One plausible result makes the experimental comparison discriminating; another makes it incapable of answering and favors field observation or a different model relation. RMP.2 returns a hold to the measurement/domain owner for that indicator-feasibility result, names both consequences, and begins no protocol Work. Whether to obtain the indicator-feasibility result remains a separate commitment.

QualifiedNoNewStudy scenario. The available evidence does not establish the relation for the bounded Pump-P4 case. The supplier confirms that the matched specimens no longer exist, and the qualified current frame shows that the obtainable field and model material cannot discriminate the competing mechanisms for that case. The present allocation answer is no new study: the relation remains unresolved. A future specimen collection would concern a different case and cannot recreate the lost comparison. If newly released, qualified field records make a relevant discriminating comparison obtainable within the available resources, reopen that choice and assess the useful study. Neither the earlier no-study answer nor a later selected design decides the maintenance interval.

RMP.2:5.2 - Citizen Stream Salinity: Dispositions without an Affiliation Gate

The resident team supplies a brief asking which rival account explains a salinity increase for a named reach and period: road-salt transport, groundwater contribution, a changed outfall, seasonal hydrology, or sensor drift. Academic status, funding, and publication plans are irrelevant.

• Return EvidenceSufficientStop if current validated monitoring and source results already discriminate the bounded anomaly for the named use. Preserve limits; the team does not need a new project for recognition.
• Return a field/observational ResearchDesignDecision when measure validity, safe site access, comparison reaches/periods, and required authority are supplied and the selected spatial-temporal contrast can challenge the live rivals. An exact trace-file locator can remain a PostSelectionNeed; calibration feasibility, site access, or admissible comparison cannot.
• Return ResearchDesignHold when sensor validity, safe/legal access, outfall-record access, or seasonal comparison availability can still make the field strategy invalid or favor source synthesis, instrument repair, or no study. The hold names the owner and result; it is not a request for an academic sponsor.

The environmental or operational receiver retains response authority. A research result may change the bounded explanation and evidence limits, not order remediation.

RMP.2:5.3 - Historical Source-Critical Case

An archive group asks whether a maintenance-practice change followed Directive-D or emerged earlier. Serious options are: stop on a current authenticated dated record; use a historical/source-critical design comparing provenance, chronology, workshop records, silences, and rival interpretations; or synthesize an already traced contested corpus when the question is corpus-level.

If the archive owner confirms access and provenance for the discriminating records, a historical/source-critical decision may be completed with only non-selection-changing transcription and locator conventions left. If provenance or access to the decisive record family remains unresolved and one result supports a chronology comparison while another eliminates it, that still-needed selection receives ResearchDesignHold. Do not substitute an experimental hierarchy or treat a reporting checklist as the design.

For a narrow chronology question, suppose one authenticated workshop series is the only presently accessible material that could distinguish practice before and after the directive. An online index and another scan format expose the same records and do not supply further design relations. A source-critical examination fits the two available investigator-days, its provenance and access are qualified, and an earlier or later dated entry would change the bounded chronology claim. This one serious research option can warrant ResearchDesignDecision; two invented designs add nothing. If that examination instead needs twenty investigator-days, supplied resource limits leave only two, and no feasible reduction preserves the discriminating relation, retain the unresolved chronology and return QualifiedNoNewStudy for that current allocation. A newly accessible independent ledger could change both the worthwhile comparison and the choice.

RMP.2:5.4 - PostSelectionNeed Counterfactual

Consider two remaining values after a field design appears selected:

The difference is not how late the team plans to resolve the item. It is whether its value can change selection.