{ "model": { "rank": 2308, "code": "thing-q43004", "model_id": "vr.tr.animism", "name": "animism", "purpose": "Let an agent describe animism as a scholarly category and as a family of traditions with attribution to the communities and to anthropology, explain its history as a concept and its modern reinterpretation, avoid treating it as primitive or as one religion, and route questions about specific traditions to their own entries.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Society, people and institutions", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "SOC", "domain": "SOC.ORG", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q43004/", "tier": 2, "score": 109, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "animism in South Sudan", "animism in the Central African Republic", "animism in Malaysia", "Hawaiian religion" ], "aliasCount": 4, "merged": 4, "knownIn": 109, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q43004", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q43004", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-12T21:34:02Z", "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-Q43004", "registryId": "vr.tr.animism", "name": "animism", "version": "0.2.0-wave.3", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "SOC.ORG" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q43004/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.animism", "name": "animism", "purpose": "Let an agent describe animism as a scholarly category and as a family of traditions with attribution to the communities and to anthropology, explain its history as a concept and its modern reinterpretation, avoid treating it as primitive or as one religion, and route questions about specific traditions to their own entries.", "definition": "The belief that natural entities such as animals, plants, places and objects possess spirit, life or personhood, and the religious practices built on that belief; a term coined by anthropologists in the nineteenth century to describe many Indigenous and traditional religions, used today in scholarship for a range of relational worldviews and by some communities as a self-description, though many traditions prefer their own names.", "what_it_is_for": "Not applicable; a category of belief and practice.", "affordances": [ "explain the concept and its history", "describe traditions grouped under it with attribution", "present scholarly debates about the term", "route to specific traditions" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Relational view of nature and persons", "Scholarly category rather than a single religion", "Present in many Indigenous and traditional religions", "Reinterpreted in recent scholarship" ], "appearance": "Not a visible object; seen in practices, places and stories of many traditions.", "visual_identification": [ "Attribution of spirit or personhood to natural entities", "Category from anthropology applied to many traditions", "Specific traditions such as Shinto or Hawaiian religion have their own entries and names" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "traditional religions of Africa, Asia, the Americas and Oceania described as animist", "animist elements within major religions", "new animism in scholarship", "self-described animism in contemporary movements", "animism as recorded in national censuses" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "traditional religion", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "belief system", "why": "a worldview" }, { "relation": "is studied by", "target": "anthropology of religion", "why": "the discipline that coined the term" }, { "relation": "is contrasted with", "target": "monotheism", "why": "in classifications of religion" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Freedom of religion protections", "Census classifications that use the category", "Indigenous rights frameworks on sacred sites" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Treating animism as primitive or as one religion", "Imposing the term on communities that reject it", "Ignoring sacred site protections" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "concept", "name": "Concept", "description": "What animism means.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "definition", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition and history of the term.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-finding", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition.", "questions": [ { "text": "What does animism mean, and how did anthropologists coin and revise the term, with attribution?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the question about the category or about a specific tradition with its own name?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "critique", "name": "Critique", "description": "Debates about the term.", "findings": [ { "id": "critique-finding", "name": "Critique", "description": "Critique.", "questions": [ { "text": "What criticisms and reinterpretations of the term exist, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation free of evolutionist framing?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "traditions", "name": "Traditions", "description": "Traditions grouped under it.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "examples", "name": "Examples", "description": "Traditions.", "findings": [ { "id": "examples-finding", "name": "Examples", "description": "Examples.", "questions": [ { "text": "Which traditions are described as animist, and how do they describe themselves?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the specific tradition?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "practice", "name": "Practice", "description": "Practices and places.", "findings": [ { "id": "practice-finding", "name": "Practice", "description": "Practice.", "questions": [ { "text": "What practices and sacred places are associated, described with attribution?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation respectful?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "data", "name": "Data", "description": "Demography and rights.", "rationale": "Sources.", "layers": [ { "id": "census", "name": "Census", "description": "Census figures.", "findings": [ { "id": "census-finding", "name": "Census", "description": "Census.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do censuses and surveys count animist or traditional religion adherents, with sources?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "text": "Which sources are cited?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "rights", "name": "Rights", "description": "Rights.", "findings": [ { "id": "rights-finding", "name": "Rights", "description": "Rights.", "questions": [ { "text": "What rights protect practitioners and sacred sites?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits Indigenous rights?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "study", "name": "Study", "description": "Scholarship and guidance.", "rationale": "Study.", "layers": [ { "id": "scholarship", "name": "Scholarship", "description": "Scholarship.", "findings": [ { "id": "scholarship-finding", "name": "Scholarship", "description": "Scholarship.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do anthropology and religious studies study animism today, and which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the anthropology of religion?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "guidance", "name": "Guidance", "description": "Guidance.", "findings": [ { "id": "guidance-finding", "name": "Guidance", "description": "Guidance.", "questions": [ { "text": "Is the user seeking religious guidance, which the community provides?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "text": "Which entry fits a specific community?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should specific traditions be linked rather than grouped?", "How should census categories be represented?", "The registry entry has merged aliases for country-level and specific traditions; 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": "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 animism, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent describe animism as a scholarly category and as a family of traditions with attribution to the communities and to anthropology, explain its history as a concept and its modern reinterpretation, avoid treating it as primitive or as one religion, and route questions about specific traditions to their own entries.", "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: animism in South Sudan, animism in the Central African Republic, animism in Malaysia, Hawaiian religion.", "4 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 109 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 animism, 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": [ "animism in South Sudan", "animism in the Central African Republic", "animism in Malaysia", "Hawaiian religion" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 109 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 4 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 animism from another, and a animism 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 animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a animism 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 animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism.", "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 animism and who fills them.", "findings": [ { "id": "role-assignments", "name": "Role assignments and their validity", "description": "Who holds which role over a animism, from when, and on whose authority.", "questions": [ { "id": "role-assignments-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a role over a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism and who may decide about it.", "findings": [ { "id": "accountability", "name": "Accountability and decision rights", "description": "Where responsibility for a animism sits when something goes wrong.", "questions": [ { "id": "accountability-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes responsibility for a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism 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 animism and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 animism is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a animism, 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 animism, 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 animism 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 } } } }