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--- name: evidence-synthesis shapes: [evidence-synthesis] description: > Turn a pile of sources into a defensible claim. Use for "what does the literature actually say?", conflicting studies or benchmarks, "is this result trustworthy?", arguments that need claim-evidence-warrant structure, qualitative data needing coding, or a theory with no catalog of its own contradicting evidence. --- # Evidence Synthesis **Problem shape:** multiple sources (papers, benchmarks, interviews, texts) must be combined into one graded conclusion — and the current draft cherry-picks, skips heterogeneity, or has no explicit warrant connecting evidence to claim. ## Relevant geniuses | Agent | Use when | |---|---| | [cochrane](../../agents/genius/cochrane.md) | studies must be systematically found, graded, and pooled; publication bias suspected; effect sizes needed, not vote-counting | | [toulmin](../../agents/genius/toulmin.md) | an argument needs explicit claim-evidence-warrant structure with qualifiers and rebuttals; standards differ by field | | [feynman](../../agents/genius/feynman.md) | a result is suspiciously clean; a citation is used without the ability to rederive it; integrity audit before publishing | | [darwin](../../agents/genius/darwin.md) | evidence accumulates over a long horizon; the theory needs a difficulty book of its own contradictions; hardest case first | | [laplace](../../agents/genius/laplace.md) | evidence must update a belief quantitatively — priors, likelihoods, calibration | | [gadamer](../../agents/genius/gadamer.md) | sources must be interpreted, not just counted — pre-understandings audited, the charitable reading found first | | [strauss](../../agents/genius/strauss.md) | qualitative data (interviews, tickets, reviews) needs open/axial coding until saturation, not anecdote-picking | | [geertz](../../agents/genius/geertz.md) | the evidence is behavior in context — thick description and emic vs etic separation before conclusions | ## Invocation 1. Pick the best-fit agent above. If two or more fit, run `tools/genius-invoker.sh route "<problem>"` and take the top ranked match. 2. Load it: `tools/genius-invoker.sh invoke <agent> "<problem>"`, then read `agents/genius/<agent>.md` in full. 3. Apply the agent's `<workflow>` step by step and answer in its `<output-format>`. Every synthesized claim carries its evidence grade and its strongest known counter-evidence (coding-standards §8: no source, no claim). 4. Typical chain: cochrane grades the corpus → toulmin structures the argument → feynman audits the integrity. Run via `tools/genius-invoker.sh compose cochrane toulmin -- "<problem>"`. 5. If no shape above matches, use a standard team agent instead. ## Refuse when - The conclusion is fixed in advance and only supporting sources are wanted. - Primary sources are unavailable and only summaries-of-summaries exist — say "I don't know" rather than synthesize hearsay.