Apply when two or more fixes that share one premise have failed the same gate. Write the premise down and test it directly before you write another fix that assumes it.
Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.
What the file says
# Attack the Premise
When two or more fixes that share one premise have failed the same gate, suspect the premise, not the fixes.
**Why:** Each failed fix is evidence against the belief it assumed. A third fix on the same premise spends effort where the evidence already says the cause is not.
**Pattern:**
- **Write the premise down.** The premise is the one sentence that every failed fix assumed.
- **Test the premise before the next fix.** Find an observation that would come out differently if the premise were false, and make it. Look at how the failures are distributed, not only at how large they are. Make the check rerunnable per [Build the Lever](../principle-build-the-lever/SKILL.md).
- **Follow the evidence.** If it contradicts the premise, the cause is elsewhere. Look for what the failures have in common that the premise did not predict. If it confirms the premise, ask the next "why" per [Fix Root Causes](../principle-fix-root-causes/SKILL.md). The earlier fixes may have treated a consequence instead of the cause.
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The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20261015.e5136d8, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_5ftlnd6mo6ffhun5
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=cursor/plugins/principle-attack-the-premise
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/6a932884daad4aa189e9b5d1665226bbc75621d4d2a398fd4003bebd382f4599
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