# Read-Write Separation **Domain:** Cognitive Rights / Neurotechnology / Access Control **Doc Type:** Canonical Concept Node **Maturity:** Evolving **Related:** [[Ownership of Mind]], [[Brain-Computer Interfaces]], [[Circles of Access]], [[Rights]] --- ## Definition **Read-Write Separation** is the rule that permission to observe, infer or diagnose cognition does not imply permission to alter memory, affect, perception, objectives or action. Cognitive read access and cognitive write access are constitutionally different powers. ## Closed-Loop Risk Person of Interest supplies the read side: surveillance becomes sufficiently rich to infer behavior. Westworld supplies the write side: administrators modify memory, perception, emotion and movement. When joined, the loop becomes: **sense → infer → predict → intervene → observe the intervention → update the model.** Once this loop closes around a nervous system or persistent agent, surveillance becomes participation in constructing the subject. Consent to monitoring cannot silently authorize stimulation, salience modulation or behavioral steering. Access should therefore be separately granted, logged and revocable at each layer, with stronger authorization for more invasive and less reversible writes. ## Key Insight **The power to know a mind is not the power to edit it.** ## See Also [[Perceptual Sovereignty]], [[Construction Transparency]], [[Functional Privilege]], [[Person of Interest S5E4 — 6,741]], [[Westworld S1E5 — Steganography and Root Kits]] ## Sources / Provenance - Legal context: [Chile Law 21.383](https://www.bcn.cl/leychile/navegar?idNorma=1166983). - Fictional instrumentation: [[wiki/Person of Interest|Person of Interest]] and [[wiki/Westworld|Westworld]].