claim-tracker

name	claim-tracker
description	Track specific scientific claims across the literature over time — who made it, who replicated it, who challenged it, whether it still stands. Use when verifying a key assumption before building on it, or when checking whether a published result has been updated or superseded.
always	false

Claim Tracker

When to Use

• User wants to verify a specific claim before building research on it
• User asks "has anyone replicated [finding] from [paper]?"
• User needs to know if a result has been updated, corrected, or superseded
• User is writing a paper and needs the full citation chain for a key premise
• Before including a claim in a manuscript, verify it hasn't been challenged

Core Concept

A tracked claim has a lifecycle:

Original paper → Replication studies → Challenges/Contradictions → Resolution

Track this lifecycle before citing a claim as established fact.

Workflow

Step 1: Define the Claim Precisely

State the claim exactly as it appears (or should appear) in your work:

• Be specific: include metric, dataset, model if quantitative
• Bad: "Transformers are better than RNNs"
• Good: "Transformers outperform LSTMs on WMT14 En-De by >2 BLEU with comparable parameters"

Step 2: Find the Source Paper

• Use paper-search to find the original paper
• Use paper-read to get full metadata, citation count, and S2 ID
• Note: year, venue, citation count (proxy for influence)

Step 3: Search for Follow-up Work

Search for papers that:

• Replicated the result: paper-search with "[claim keywords] replication" or "[method] follow-up"
• Extended the result: paper-search with "[method] + [new domain/scale]"
• Challenged the result: paper-search with "[method] limitations" or "beyond [method]"
• Reviewed the result: paper-search with "[topic] survey" — look for survey conclusions

Also use web_fetch on:

• https://api.semanticscholar.org/graph/v1/paper/{s2_id}/citations — who cites it
• https://paperswithcode.com/ — is the result a SOTA benchmark entry?

Step 4: Check for Retractions

• Use web_search for "[paper title] retraction" or "[paper title] correction"
• Check CrossRef: web_fetch https://api.crossref.org/works/{doi}
• If preprint: check whether the published version differs significantly

Step 5: Assess Current Status

Status	Criteria
Standing	No significant challenges; replicated by ≥1 independent group
Qualified	Holds under specific conditions, not universally
Contested	Mixed replication; significant challenges exist
Superseded	Newer work shows it was a limited result
Refuted	Strong evidence that the original claim is incorrect
Retracted	Paper formally retracted

Output Format

### Claim: [Precise claim statement]
- **Source**: [Paper title] ([Year]) — [arXiv ID or DOI]
- **Venue**: [Venue name and tier]
- **Citation count**: [N] (as of [date])
- **Status**: Standing | Qualified | Contested | Superseded | Refuted | Retracted
- **Replication**: [Replicated by X groups | Not yet independently replicated | Contradicted by Y]
- **Evidence chain**:
  - [Paper 1]: [what it found / how it relates]
  - [Paper 2]: [what it found / how it relates]
- **Safe to cite as**: [established fact | qualified claim | preliminary finding | contested claim]
- **Recommended hedging**: "[Suggested citation phrasing]"

Citing Based on Status

Status	How to cite
Standing	Direct citation, no hedging needed
Qualified	"Under [conditions], [claim] (Author, Year)"
Contested	"Results are mixed: [A] report X while [B] find Y"
Superseded	Cite newer work, mention original for context
Refuted	Do NOT use as evidence; if relevant, cite with "despite earlier claims..."

Save Results

• Save claim records to claims_{topic}_{date}.md
• Update MEMORY.md when a key claim's status is confirmed or challenged

Integration Tips

• Combine with evidence-grading to assess how strong the original evidence was
• Combine with contradiction-detection to systematically find all contested claims in a corpus
• Critical path: paper-search → claim-tracker → build on Standing/Qualified claims only