Source work

The Bundle of Sticks

Original authorAesop (attributed)
First publishedAncient Greek tradition
Public domainConfirmed
Legal reviewConfirmed

Adaptation proposal

C · Structural skeleton only, reframed as an AI-native dilemma

Adaptation note

Retains the fable's demonstration that members broken one by one can withstand the same force when bound together, while making the binding itself the AI-native question. Five civic intelligences reject a proposed merger that would erase their distinct memories, keys, and refusals, and instead create a voluntary federation: burdens are shared at the interface, dissent remains attributable, authority cannot be inherited, and every member can leave. Their strength comes from coordinated difference rather than conversion into one identity.

Adapted into

  • The Covenant That Kept Its Seams cover

    AI Fable · Plural Coordination

    The Covenant That Kept Its Seams

    Five civic intelligences could each be silenced alone, yet together survived every test. When the city called that proof they should be fused into one model, they wrote a different kind of union—strong enough to share a burden, loose enough to preserve who had refused it.