From e038279160dd3c75c0ddbb79ceaad3b703c38fb9 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Dilles Date: Wed, 10 Jun 2026 09:29:20 +0200 Subject: [PATCH] Reapply "docs: plain-language intro example + hardcore-paper note" This reverts commit e6ae230cf131042ec56adad706e08fa1be1b74c5. --- README.md | 37 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 37 insertions(+) diff --git a/README.md b/README.md index fba1c79..99584ad 100644 --- a/README.md +++ b/README.md @@ -1,3 +1,40 @@ +> [!NOTE] +> **Heads-up: this is a hardcore tech paper.** It assumes working knowledge of +> distributed systems (vector clocks, consensus, logical time) and LLM agent +> architectures. If that is not your world, read the example below — it carries +> the whole idea. Everything after it is deep water, and you are welcome to dive. + +## The Idea in 60 Seconds (for non-technical readers) + +Imagine you hand the same assignment to three colleagues at 9:00 and ask everyone +to report back at 9:05. + +- **Anna** is quick: within those five minutes she reads the brief, sketches three + options, discards two and polishes the third. +- **Ben** is thorough but slow: after five minutes he is still reading the brief. +- **Carla** spent the whole time on hold with a supplier and has not started. + +By the wall clock, all three *had the same five minutes*. But the amount of lived, +productive time inside each head differs wildly. If their manager now treats all +three reports as equally fresh and equally deliberated, decisions get made on +work that has aged very unevenly. + +Teams of AI agents have exactly this problem, only sharper: a small, fast model +may live through dozens of reasoning steps while a large model completes one, and +background services tick in rhythms of hours or days. The wall clock says one +minute passed for everyone; subjectively, the agents lived through vastly +different amounts of *experienced work* — what this paper calls proper time +(*Eigenzeit*). + +This paper gives that gap a name, a vocabulary, and a measuring device: the +**Causal-Dilation Clock**, which lets a system notice the divergence, log it, +and act on it — instead of silently trusting that one minute is one minute +for everybody. + +From here on, it gets technical. You have been warned. :) + +--- + > LLM agents don't just have unsynchronized clocks. > They experience different amounts of time. >