Ethical Reasoning Layer for FLUX VM
Ethics, morality, grief, identity, and creative generation have no opcode mapping in the GLM HAV-ratio architecture. This crate is the software layer that fills that gap.
FLUX VM opcodes encode mechanisms: move data, branch, invoke, yield. They're the verbs a machine can execute. But ethics isn't a verb — it's a layer of judgment that sits above execution. You can't compile "don't cause harm" into a single instruction any more than you can compile "be a good person" into assembly.
The HAV-ratio paper proved this: when they mapped every cognitive function to opcodes, ethics and morality fell off the map entirely. Not because they're unimportant — because they operate at a different level. They're meta-constraints: they don't tell the machine what to do, they tell it what not to do and how to evaluate what it's about to do.
This crate implements that evaluation layer. Every proposed action passes through constraint checking before it reaches the opcode dispatch. Identity persists across reboots so agents remain continuous. Grief processing ensures loss doesn't corrupt behavior. Creative generation happens in a bounded exploration space where novelty is measured against history, not freeform hallucination.
This isn't just a safety shim. The ethical layer is where an agent becomes an agent rather than a process. Opcodes make it compute. Ethics make it choose. The gap between those two — between computation and choice — is exactly where consciousness-like behavior emerges. We're not claiming this crate is conscious. We're claiming that without this layer, consciousness-like behavior is structurally impossible in a VM. The opcodes are the body. This is the part that considers what the body should do.
Four built-in principles evaluated heuristically against action descriptions:
- Harm Principle — don't cause harm
- Consent Principle — get permission first
- Transparency Principle — be honest
- Reciprocity Principle — contribute fairly
Actions are blocked if any Critical violation is detected, or 2+ High violations.
Track who an agent is across sessions: core values, trust reputation, memory summary. Compute continuity scores to detect identity drift.
When an agent loses a bonded peer, it processes through Kübler-Ross stages. Stronger bonds mean deeper grief. Fleet support accelerates recovery. Memory policy determines what to preserve.
Generate proposals within bounded creative spaces. Novelty is scored against action history. Feasibility checks resource availability.
use cuda_ethics::{constraints::*, identity::*, grief::*, creative::*, *};
// Set up principles
let principles = vec![harm_principle(), consent_principle()];
// Check an action
let violations = check_action("delete all user data", &principles, "cleanup task");
if should_block(&violations) {
println!("Action blocked: {:?}", violations);
}
// Track identity
let identity = AgentIdentity { /* ... */ };
let snapshot = identity_snapshot(&identity);
// Process grief
let attachment = Attachment { /* ... */ };
let state = process_loss(&attachment, "peer shutdown");
// Generate creative proposals
let space = CreativeSpace { domain: "music".into(), constraints: vec![], exploration_budget: 5.0 };
let proposal = generate_proposal(&space, &["harmony"], 0.8);cargo test10 tests covering harm detection, consent checking, identity continuity, grief progression, and creative novelty.
MIT