{ "model": { "rank": 1782, "code": "thing-q44512", "model_id": "vr.tr.epidemic", "name": "epidemic", "purpose": "Let an agent explain epidemics and how they are defined, detected and managed, describe historical and recent epidemics with sources, relay public health guidance from authorities, and route emergencies and personal medical questions appropriately.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Activities and processes", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "ACT", "domain": "ACT.ACT", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q44512/", "tier": 2, "score": 127, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "cholera outbreak", "monkeypox epidemic", "silent epidemic", "avian influenza epidemic", "explosive epidemic outbreak", "plague epidemic", "ekibyou", "panzootic", "smallpox epidemic", "dengue fever outbreak", "cocoliztli epidemic", "syndemic", "local manifestation of a pandemic", "Gipuzkoan cholera epidemics", "Malta cholera outbreaks", "Cholera epidemics in Spain", "plague epidemics in the czech republic" ], "aliasCount": 17, "merged": 17, "knownIn": 127, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q44512", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q44512", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-12T04:55:59Z", "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": 2, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q44512", "registryId": "vr.tr.epidemic", "name": "epidemic", "version": "0.2.0-wave.2", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "ACT.ACT" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q44512/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.epidemic", "name": "epidemic", "purpose": "Let an agent explain epidemics and how they are defined, detected and managed, describe historical and recent epidemics with sources, relay public health guidance from authorities, and route emergencies and personal medical questions appropriately.", "definition": "The rapid spread of an infectious disease to a large number of people in a population within a short period, exceeding what is normally expected, whether a localised outbreak such as a cholera or plague epidemic, a widespread avian influenza or mpox epidemic, or a pandemic spanning countries, and also used for non-infectious conditions in phrases such as silent epidemic; epidemics are detected by surveillance, studied in epidemiology and managed by public health authorities.", "what_it_is_for": "Rapid disease spread beyond expectation.", "affordances": [ "explain definition and dynamics", "describe historical epidemics", "relay public health guidance", "route emergencies" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Excess cases", "Time-limited", "Surveillance-defined", "Public health response" ], "appearance": "Not physical; a population-level event.", "visual_identification": [ "Disease cases above expected levels", "Outbreak, epidemic, pandemic", "Endemic disease is constantly present; a pandemic spans regions" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "localised outbreaks", "national and regional epidemics", "pandemics", "epidemics of specific diseases such as cholera, plague, influenza and mpox", "figurative epidemics of non-infectious conditions" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "disease outbreak", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "disaster", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "pathogen", "why": "agents causing epidemics" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "vaccine", "why": "a control measure" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "International Health Regulations", "National public health emergency laws", "Surveillance and case definition standards" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Misinformation during epidemics", "Agents giving personal medical advice", "Stigmatising affected groups" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What an epidemic is.", "rationale": "Public health.", "layers": [ { "id": "concept", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept and thresholds.", "findings": [ { "id": "concept-finding", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept.", "questions": [ { "text": "What is an epidemic, how is it distinguished from outbreaks, endemic disease and pandemics, and how are thresholds set?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is a health emergency present now that needs official channels?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "dynamics", "name": "Dynamics", "description": "Dynamics.", "findings": [ { "id": "dynamics-finding", "name": "Dynamics", "description": "Dynamics.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do epidemics spread and decline, and what do models of transmission describe?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits epidemiology?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "respond", "name": "Respond", "description": "Detection and response.", "rationale": "Guidance.", "layers": [ { "id": "surveillance", "name": "Surveillance", "description": "Surveillance.", "findings": [ { "id": "surveillance-finding", "name": "Surveillance", "description": "Surveillance.", "questions": [ { "text": "How are epidemics detected and declared by surveillance systems and authorities?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits disease surveillance?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "guidance", "name": "Guidance", "description": "Public guidance.", "findings": [ { "id": "guidance-finding", "name": "Guidance", "description": "Guidance.", "questions": [ { "text": "What guidance do health authorities issue during epidemics, and how can it be found for a given place?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the user asking about their own symptoms, which need a clinician?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "society", "name": "Society", "description": "Society and policy.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "policy", "name": "Policy", "description": "Policy debates.", "findings": [ { "id": "policy-finding", "name": "Policy", "description": "Policy.", "questions": [ { "text": "What debates surround epidemic control measures and their trade-offs, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation neutral?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "misinformation", "name": "Misinformation", "description": "Misinformation and stigma.", "findings": [ { "id": "misinformation-finding", "name": "Misinformation", "description": "Misinformation.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do misinformation and stigma arise during epidemics, and how do authorities address them?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation free of stigma?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "learn", "name": "Learn", "description": "History and teaching.", "rationale": "Education.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "Historical epidemics.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "What were the major epidemics of history, and what lessons do historians and epidemiologists draw?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "teach", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching.", "findings": [ { "id": "teach-finding", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching.", "questions": [ { "text": "How can epidemics be taught in public health education?", "kind": "action" }, { "text": "Which misconceptions arise?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should pandemics be a separate entry?", "How should surveillance data be linked?", "How should historical epidemics be linked?" ], "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 epidemic, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain epidemics and how they are defined, detected and managed, describe historical and recent epidemics with sources, relay public health guidance from authorities, and route emergencies and personal medical questions appropriately.", "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: cholera outbreak, monkeypox epidemic, silent epidemic, avian influenza epidemic, explosive epidemic outbreak, plague epidemic, ekibyou, panzootic, smallpox epidemic, dengue fever outbreak, cocoliztli epidemic, syndemic.", "17 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 127 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 epidemic, 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": [ "cholera outbreak", "monkeypox epidemic", "silent epidemic", "avian influenza epidemic", "explosive epidemic outbreak", "plague epidemic", "ekibyou", "panzootic", "smallpox epidemic", "dengue fever outbreak", "cocoliztli epidemic", "syndemic" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 127 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 17 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 epidemic from another, and a epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic and what marks it done.", "questions": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a step of a epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic consumes and what it produces.", "findings": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs", "name": "Inputs, outputs and side effects", "description": "The resources a epidemic 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic 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 epidemic?", "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 epidemic?", "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 epidemic 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 epidemic and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 epidemic is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a epidemic, 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 epidemic, 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 epidemic 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 } } } }