{ "model": { "rank": 7818, "code": "thing-q1074275", "model_id": "vr.tr.chinese-folk-religion", "name": "Chinese folk religion", "purpose": "Let an agent explain Chinese folk religion, relay beliefs, practices, history and contemporary status from religious studies and ethnographic sources with attribution, describe the movements and forms the registry aliases name, and distinguish folk religion from Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and new religious movements, presenting all traditions respectfully.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Society, people and institutions", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "SOC", "domain": "SOC.ORG", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q1074275/", "tier": 2, "score": 53, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "Maitreyanism", "Nuoism", "Pu-an School", "Heaven worship", "Chinese folk religion in Southeast Asia" ], "aliasCount": 5, "merged": 5, "knownIn": 53, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q1074275", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1074275", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-13T19:00:33Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 4, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q1074275", "registryId": "vr.tr.chinese-folk-religion", "name": "Chinese folk religion", "version": "0.2.0-wave.4", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "SOC.ORG" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q1074275/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.chinese-folk-religion", "name": "Chinese folk religion", "purpose": "Let an agent explain Chinese folk religion, relay beliefs, practices, history and contemporary status from religious studies and ethnographic sources with attribution, describe the movements and forms the registry aliases name, and distinguish folk religion from Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and new religious movements, presenting all traditions respectfully.", "definition": "The diverse traditions of religious practice among Chinese people outside or alongside institutional Buddhism and Taoism, including ancestor veneration, worship of Heaven and local deities, temple festivals, divination and spirit mediumship, found in mainland China, Taiwan and Chinese communities in Southeast Asia, and associated with sectarian and regional movements such as Maitreyan salvationist traditions, the Pu an school and Nuo ritual theatre and exorcism; the model presents these traditions respectfully, with state policies and scholarly classifications attributed.", "what_it_is_for": "Not applicable; a religious tradition.", "affordances": [ "explain beliefs and practices", "relay history and status with attribution", "describe named movements", "distinguish related traditions" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Diffuse and local", "Ancestor and deity veneration", "Overlaps with Taoism and Buddhism", "Regional diversity" ], "appearance": "Not a visible object; temples, shrines, festivals and household altars.", "visual_identification": [ "Chinese popular religious traditions", "Heaven worship, Maitreyanism, Nuoism, Pu an School, folk religion in Southeast Asia", "Taoism and Buddhism are institutional religions; Confucianism is an ethical tradition; new religious movements are recent organisations" ], "physical_properties": [ { "quantity": "adherents", "typical_range": "hundreds of millions", "unit": "note", "note": "estimates vary widely by definition" }, { "quantity": "Mazu worship", "typical_range": "major folk cult in coastal China and Taiwan", "unit": "note", "note": "" }, { "quantity": "Nuo", "typical_range": "ritual masked exorcism and theatre", "unit": "note", "note": "" } ], "families_and_kinds": [ "ancestor veneration", "Heaven worship", "local deity cults such as Mazu", "salvationist sects such as Maitreyan traditions and the Pu an school", "Nuo ritual traditions", "Chinese folk religion in Southeast Asia" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "folk religion", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "overlaps with", "target": "Taoism", "why": "" }, { "relation": "includes", "target": "ancestor veneration in China", "why": "" }, { "relation": "is practised in", "target": "Taiwan", "why": "widely" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "State religious affairs regulations in China and elsewhere", "Freedom of religion protections" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Dismissing folk practice as superstition", "Partisan framing of state policy", "Confusing overlapping traditions" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What Chinese folk religion is.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "definition", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-finding", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition.", "questions": [ { "text": "What is Chinese folk religion, and how does it differ from Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and new religious movements?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the question about beliefs, a practice, a movement, a region or policy?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "forms", "name": "Forms", "description": "Named forms.", "findings": [ { "id": "forms-finding", "name": "Forms", "description": "Forms.", "questions": [ { "text": "What are Heaven worship, Maitreyan traditions, Nuo, the Pu an school and Southeast Asian Chinese folk religion?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the specific form?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "practice", "name": "Practice", "description": "Practice.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "rituals", "name": "Rituals", "description": "Rituals.", "findings": [ { "id": "rituals-finding", "name": "Rituals", "description": "Rituals.", "questions": [ { "text": "What rituals, festivals and temple practices are common, presented respectfully?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "deities", "name": "Deities", "description": "Deities and ancestors.", "findings": [ { "id": "deities-finding", "name": "Deities", "description": "Deities.", "questions": [ { "text": "How are ancestors and deities such as Mazu and Guan Yu venerated?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which sources are cited?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History and status.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How have folk traditions and sectarian movements developed, as historians describe?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits Chinese salvationist religions?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "status", "name": "Status", "description": "Contemporary status.", "findings": [ { "id": "status-finding", "name": "Status", "description": "Status.", "questions": [ { "text": "How have policies in mainland China and Taiwan treated folk religion, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation respectful and neutral?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "context", "name": "Context", "description": "Diaspora and scholarship.", "rationale": "Context.", "layers": [ { "id": "diaspora", "name": "Diaspora", "description": "Southeast Asia.", "findings": [ { "id": "diaspora-finding", "name": "Diaspora", "description": "Diaspora.", "questions": [ { "text": "How is Chinese folk religion practised in Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits Chinese temples in Southeast Asia?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "scholarship", "name": "Scholarship", "description": "Scholarship.", "findings": [ { "id": "scholarship-finding", "name": "Scholarship", "description": "Scholarship.", "questions": [ { "text": "How have scholars debated whether Chinese folk religion is one religion, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits religion in China?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should Nuoism and Maitreyanism be separate primary entries?", "How should religious studies sources be linked?", "How should state classifications be attributed?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "organisation or institution", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a Chinese folk religion, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain Chinese folk religion, relay beliefs, practices, history and contemporary status from religious studies and ethnographic sources with attribution, describe the movements and forms the registry aliases name, and distinguish folk religion from Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and new religious movements, presenting all traditions respectfully.", "characteristics": { "substance": "social", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "collective" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: Maitreyanism, Nuoism, Pu-an School, Heaven worship, Chinese folk religion in Southeast Asia.", "5 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 53 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a Chinese folk religion, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "a social arrangement between people", "physicalCharacter": [ "Acts through people, and only through them.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. Recognised by name, register entry and the people acting in its name, and those change while it stays the same body." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "Maitreyanism", "Nuoism", "Pu-an School", "Heaven worship", "Chinese folk religion in Southeast Asia" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 53 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 5 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one Chinese folk religion from another, and a Chinese folk religion from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a Chinese folk religion sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a Chinese folk religion from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a Chinese folk religion passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a Chinese folk religion between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a Chinese folk religion, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a Chinese folk religion is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "people-and-responsibility", "name": "People, roles and responsibility", "description": "Who stands in what relation to a Chinese folk religion.", "rationale": "Social things are defined by the relations people hold to them, and those relations change without the thing changing.", "layers": [ { "id": "roles-and-parties", "name": "Roles and parties", "description": "The roles that exist around a Chinese folk religion and who fills them.", "findings": [ { "id": "role-assignments", "name": "Role assignments and their validity", "description": "Who holds which role over a Chinese folk religion, from when, and on whose authority.", "questions": [ { "id": "role-assignments-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a role over a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "role-assignments-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a role over a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "role-assignments-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a role over a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "ownership-and-accountability", "name": "Ownership and accountability", "description": "Who answers for a Chinese folk religion and who may decide about it.", "findings": [ { "id": "accountability", "name": "Accountability and decision rights", "description": "Where responsibility for a Chinese folk religion sits when something goes wrong.", "questions": [ { "id": "accountability-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes responsibility for a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "accountability-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about responsibility for a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "accountability-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once responsibility for a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "legal-identity", "name": "Legal identity and mandate", "description": "What Chinese folk religion is in law and what it exists to do.", "rationale": "Legal identity survives changes of name, address, staff and premises, which is exactly why it must be recorded separately from all of them.", "layers": [ { "id": "registration", "name": "Legal form and registration", "description": "Form, register, identifiers and jurisdiction.", "findings": [ { "id": "registration-record", "name": "Registration and identifiers", "description": "What names this body unambiguously in law.", "questions": [ { "id": "registration-record-q01", "text": "What legal form does Chinese folk religion take, in which register, under which identifier?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "registration-record-q02", "text": "What survives a rename, a merger or a move of premises, and what does not?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "mandate", "name": "Mandate and governing instrument", "description": "The purpose it is bound to and the document that binds it.", "findings": [ { "id": "mandate-record", "name": "Mandate and its source", "description": "What it may do, and the instrument that says so.", "questions": [ { "id": "mandate-record-q01", "text": "What is the mandate of Chinese folk religion, and which founding or governing instrument grants it?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "id": "mandate-record-q02", "text": "What lies outside the mandate, and what should an agent do when asked for it?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "governance-and-membership", "name": "Governance, membership and decision rights", "description": "Who decides in Chinese folk religion and who belongs to it.", "rationale": "Authority inside an organisation is held by roles, not people, and an agent needs to know which role can commit it.", "layers": [ { "id": "decision-rights", "name": "Decision rights", "description": "Bodies, offices and what each may bind.", "findings": [ { "id": "authority-map", "name": "Who may bind the organisation", "description": "The offices that can commit it and their limits.", "questions": [ { "id": "authority-map-q01", "text": "Which bodies or offices of Chinese folk religion may take which decisions, and up to what limit?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "authority-map-q02", "text": "What evidence shows that a given person currently holds that office?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "membership", "name": "Membership and affiliation", "description": "Who counts as part of it and on what terms.", "findings": [ { "id": "membership-rules", "name": "Membership and its evidence", "description": "Classes of member, how membership starts and ends.", "questions": [ { "id": "membership-rules-q01", "text": "What kinds of membership or affiliation does Chinese folk religion have, and how does each begin and end?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "membership-rules-q02", "text": "What may a member do in its name, and what may they not?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a Chinese folk religion came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a Chinese folk religion and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a Chinese folk religion is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a Chinese folk religion, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a Chinese folk religion, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a Chinese folk religion is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }