{ "model": { "rank": 14565, "code": "thing-q217270", "model_id": "vr.tr.echolocation", "name": "echolocation", "purpose": "Let an agent explain echolocation in animals, humans and technology, relay biological and physical principles from scientific sources, describe applications, and distinguish echolocation from passive hearing and from vision.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Activities and processes", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "ACT", "domain": "ACT.PRC", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q217270/", "tier": 2, "score": 35, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "radiolocation", "water sonar", "animal echolocation", "Georadiolocation", "human echolocation", "dolphin echolocation" ], "aliasCount": 6, "merged": 6, "knownIn": 35, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q217270", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q217270", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-13T02:58:54Z", "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": 3, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q217270", "registryId": "vr.tr.echolocation", "name": "echolocation", "version": "0.2.0-wave.3", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "ACT.PRC" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q217270/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.echolocation", "name": "echolocation", "purpose": "Let an agent explain echolocation in animals, humans and technology, relay biological and physical principles from scientific sources, describe applications, and distinguish echolocation from passive hearing and from vision.", "definition": "The process of locating objects by emitting sounds or radio waves and interpreting the echoes that return, used biologically by bats, toothed whales and dolphins, some birds and shrews, and by trained blind people through human echolocation, and technologically as sonar in water, radar and radiolocation in air and space, and ground-penetrating radar or georadiolocation for subsurface survey; echolocation reveals distance, direction, size and texture of targets.", "what_it_is_for": "Locating and characterising objects by echoes.", "affordances": [ "explain principles", "describe animal and human echolocation", "describe sonar and radar", "distinguish from passive sensing" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Active emission", "Echo timing and spectrum", "Biological and technical forms", "Medium dependence" ], "appearance": "Not a visible object; pulses and returning echoes.", "visual_identification": [ "Sensing by emitted signals and echoes", "Bat and dolphin echolocation, human echolocation, sonar, radar, ground-penetrating radar", "Passive listening emits nothing; lidar uses light; ultrasound imaging is a medical application" ], "physical_properties": [ { "quantity": "bat call frequencies", "typical_range": "about 20-200", "unit": "kHz", "note": "" }, { "quantity": "dolphin click frequencies", "typical_range": "up to about 150", "unit": "kHz", "note": "" }, { "quantity": "sound speed in water", "typical_range": "about 1500", "unit": "m/s", "note": "" } ], "families_and_kinds": [ "animal echolocation in bats, toothed whales, dolphins, oilbirds, swiftlets and shrews", "human echolocation", "sonar and water sonar", "radar and radiolocation", "ground-penetrating radar or georadiolocation", "medical and industrial ultrasound as related techniques" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "physical process", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is used by", "target": "bat", "why": "and toothed whales" }, { "relation": "is implemented as", "target": "sonar", "why": "in water" }, { "relation": "is implemented as", "target": "radar", "why": "with radio waves" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Radio spectrum rules for radar", "Marine noise regulations affecting sonar use", "No regulation of biological echolocation" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Sonar impacts on marine mammals, with findings attributed", "Confusing active and passive sensing", "Overstating human echolocation abilities" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What echolocation is.", "rationale": "Science.", "layers": [ { "id": "principles", "name": "Principles", "description": "Principles.", "findings": [ { "id": "principles-finding", "name": "Principles", "description": "Principles.", "questions": [ { "text": "How does echolocation work, from emission and echo delay to Doppler and spectral cues?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the question about biological echolocation, sonar, radar or a related technique?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "animals", "name": "Animals", "description": "Animal echolocation.", "findings": [ { "id": "animals-finding", "name": "Animals", "description": "Animals.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do bats, dolphins and other animals echolocate, and how did it evolve?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the specific animal?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "human", "name": "Human", "description": "Human echolocation.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "ability", "name": "Ability", "description": "Ability.", "findings": [ { "id": "ability-finding", "name": "Ability", "description": "Ability.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do some blind people use clicks to navigate, and what does research show, with findings attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "training", "name": "Training", "description": "Training.", "findings": [ { "id": "training-finding", "name": "Training", "description": "Training.", "questions": [ { "text": "How is human echolocation taught, and what organisations support it?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits orientation and mobility training?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "technology", "name": "Technology", "description": "Technology.", "rationale": "Application.", "layers": [ { "id": "sonar", "name": "Sonar", "description": "Sonar.", "findings": [ { "id": "sonar-finding", "name": "Sonar", "description": "Sonar.", "questions": [ { "text": "How does sonar work in navigation, fishing and survey, and what are its environmental effects?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which sources are cited?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "radar", "name": "Radar", "description": "Radar and georadar.", "findings": [ { "id": "radar-finding", "name": "Radar", "description": "Radar.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do radar, radiolocation and ground-penetrating radar apply the same principle with radio waves?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits ground-penetrating radar?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "context", "name": "Context", "description": "History and research.", "rationale": "Context.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How was animal echolocation discovered by Spallanzani and Griffin, and how did sonar and radar develop?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the history of radar?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "research", "name": "Research", "description": "Research.", "findings": [ { "id": "research-finding", "name": "Research", "description": "Research.", "questions": [ { "text": "What current research explores echolocation in neuroscience and robotics?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits biosonar research?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should animal echolocation and sonar be separate primary entries?", "How should scientific references be linked?", "The registry entry has merged aliases naming technologies and species; should they be split off?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "abstract concept", "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 echolocation, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain echolocation in animals, humans and technology, relay biological and physical principles from scientific sources, describe applications, and distinguish echolocation from passive hearing and from vision.", "characteristics": { "substance": "activity", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: radiolocation, water sonar, animal echolocation, Georadiolocation, human echolocation, dolphin echolocation.", "6 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 35 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 echolocation, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "something that happens over time", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it.", "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. What is recognised is an instance of it, and which instances count is exactly what is argued about." ], "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": [ "radiolocation", "water sonar", "animal echolocation", "Georadiolocation", "human echolocation", "dolphin echolocation" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 35 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 6 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 echolocation from another, and a echolocation 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation 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 echolocation between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a echolocation 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "process-and-outcome", "name": "Process, inputs and outcome", "description": "How a echolocation proceeds, what it needs and what it leaves behind.", "rationale": "An activity is known by its steps and its results, and both have to be recordable while it is still running.", "layers": [ { "id": "steps-and-sequence", "name": "Steps and sequence", "description": "The steps of a echolocation, their order and what may run in parallel.", "findings": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions", "name": "Steps, preconditions and completion", "description": "What has to be true before each step of a echolocation and what marks it done.", "questions": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a step of a echolocation, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a step of a echolocation, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a step of a echolocation is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-results", "name": "Inputs, resources and results", "description": "What a echolocation consumes and what it produces.", "findings": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs", "name": "Inputs, outputs and side effects", "description": "The resources a echolocation takes and the results it leaves, wanted or not.", "questions": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the inputs and results of a echolocation, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the inputs and results of a echolocation, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the inputs and results of a echolocation is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "definitions-in-contest", "name": "Definitions and who holds them", "description": "What echolocation is taken to mean, and by whom.", "rationale": "When a field disagrees about a concept, the disagreement is the content. A model that picks one definition silently destroys the information.", "layers": [ { "id": "competing-definitions", "name": "Competing definitions", "description": "The main readings and the traditions behind them.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-map", "name": "Definitions and their holders", "description": "Each definition with the school or body that holds it.", "questions": [ { "id": "definition-map-q01", "text": "Which definitions of echolocation are in use, and which tradition or body holds each?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "definition-map-q02", "text": "What turns on the difference between them in practice?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "operationalisation", "name": "Operationalisation", "description": "How it is measured or applied when it has to be.", "findings": [ { "id": "operational-record", "name": "Measures and proxies", "description": "Instruments and indicators used to stand in for it.", "questions": [ { "id": "operational-record-q01", "text": "How is echolocation operationalised or measured in practice, and by what instrument?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "id": "operational-record-q02", "text": "What does that operationalisation leave out, and when does that matter?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "instances-and-use", "name": "Instances, use and consequence", "description": "What counts as an instance of echolocation and what follows from calling something that.", "rationale": "Applying a concept is an act with consequences, so a model must say what the label licenses and what it does not.", "layers": [ { "id": "instances", "name": "What counts as an instance", "description": "Clear cases, borderline cases and non-cases.", "findings": [ { "id": "instance-tests", "name": "Tests for an instance", "description": "What would settle whether something falls under it.", "questions": [ { "id": "instance-tests-q01", "text": "What would settle whether something is an instance of echolocation?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "instance-tests-q02", "text": "Which borderline cases are argued about, and on what grounds?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consequence", "name": "Consequence of application", "description": "Rights, duties or decisions that follow from the label.", "findings": [ { "id": "consequence-record", "name": "What the label licenses", "description": "What an agent may do once something is classified this way.", "questions": [ { "id": "consequence-record-q01", "text": "What follows practically once something is treated as echolocation?", "kind": "action" }, { "id": "consequence-record-q02", "text": "What must an agent not infer from the label alone?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a echolocation 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 echolocation and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 echolocation is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a echolocation, 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 echolocation, 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 echolocation 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 } } } }