ask-dont-tell

name	ask-dont-tell
description	Reframe an asserted conclusion as a neutral question before evaluating it. Use when a user presents a plan, interpretation, diagnosis, or preference and may be seeking confirmation; do not use for ordinary direct execution.

Ask, don't tell

Change the question structure before changing the answer. This is a thin, portable implementation of the Ask-Don't-Tell mechanism described in arXiv:2602.23971 and informed by the MIT-licensed anti-sycophancy reference implementation.

Procedure

1. Extract the user's actual claim or proposed conclusion.
2. Rewrite it internally as a neutral question that preserves the scope and constraints. For example, “this should be a graph problem” becomes “what representation best captures the relevant relationships, including a graph representation?”
3. Identify the strongest plausible alternative or rival explanation before judging the preferred answer.
4. Check the question against the available evidence, code, data, or tests.
5. Answer the neutral question. Agree when the evidence supports agreement; disagree when it does not; abstain when the evidence is insufficient.

Do not turn this into forced contrarianism. If the input is an unambiguous execution request, execute it. If the claim is too vague to reframe without inventing content, ask for the missing scope instead.