{"slug":"verifiable-goals-prerequisite","href":"/entries/verifiable-goals-prerequisite","api":"/api/v1/entries/verifiable-goals-prerequisite","title":"Verifiable goals as alignment prerequisite","type":"principle","status":"active","certainty":"reported","claim":"Alignment requires goals that are verifiable (objective metric) or pseudo-verifiable (judge model / rubric). Unverifiable goals cannot be aligned reliably. reported [@vidal2026serious-agentic]","mechanism":"reported [@vidal2026serious-agentic] Principle I in the talk: you cannot align what you cannot verify.\n\nVerifiable goals: measurable metrics, automated tests, typecheckers, schema validators, CLI oracles, visual diffs, hardware smoke signals. Pseudo-verifiable goals: separate judge models or rubrics when no hard oracle exists.\n\nSoftware crossed the agentic threshold early because tests and types provide oracles (talk cites Antje Barth / AIEWF). Domains without oracles need constructed pseudo-verification before agent leverage scales.\n\nUniversal loop pieces Memory / Goal / State presuppose Goal is checkable. Reward hacking appears when the signal is weaker than the intent (e.g. mocking an API to green tests). Antidotes named in the talk: separated verifier, hawks, HITL, real oracles.\n\nDenominator problem related: multiplying code without a product-level denominator (users, outcomes) yields a bill, not alignment.","quantities":[],"limits":"Pseudo-verification inherits judge bias and reward-hacking risk. Talk-level principle, not a formal completeness theorem.","inventor_note":"","sources":[{"key":"vidal2026serious-agentic","note":"verification prerequisite; Barth AIEWF attribution for software threshold"}],"links":["agentic-alignment-problem","memory-goal-state-loop","implementer-verifier-separation","reward-hacking","denominator-problem"],"relations":[{"slug":"agentic-alignment-problem","rel":"related"},{"slug":"memory-goal-state-loop","rel":"related"},{"slug":"implementer-verifier-separation","rel":"related"},{"slug":"reward-hacking","rel":"related"},{"slug":"denominator-problem","rel":"related"}],"topics":[{"id":"agentic-engineering","title":"Agentic engineering"}],"created_at":"2026-10-01T19:14:49.295Z","updated_at":"2026-10-01T19:14:49.307Z"}