# Paper A Round 28 Review — codex GPT-5.5 v4 round 8

Reviewer: gpt-5.5
Date: 2026-05-14
Target: paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md + paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md + paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md (post round-2 fixes, commit b884d39)
Prior reviewer artifacts: paper/codex_review_gpt55_v4_round7.md; paper/gemini_review_v4_round1.md; paper/opus_review_v4_round1.md
Round-2 commit reviewed: b884d39

## Verdict

Minor Revision.

Round-2 closes the empirical substance of Opus M2-M4 and the core of M1/M3: the deployed any-pair vs same-pair within-firm collision semantics are now separated in the body, the §IV K=3 mechanism-label regression is mostly repaired, §V headings now run A-H, and the Table XV-B cascade has been applied in the public §IV table sequence.

However, the round-2 pass introduced or exposed several splice blockers: the abstract is now 261 words against the stated <=250 target; the new §IV-J Table XV sample-size footnote incorrectly says §IV-M.5 uses n=150,442 even though Script 44 / Tables XXIV-XXV use the 150,453 vector-complete substrate; §IV-I still points the ICCR calibration reader to "§IV-M Table XVI" although the relevant tables are now XXI-XXVI; and internal draft notes/checklists still contain stale Table XV-B / >=97% / hand-leaning language. No new statistical work is required, but the manuscript is not ready for splice until those are patched.

## Round-1 panel finding closure table

| Source | Finding | Current status | Evidence / note |
|---|---|---|---|
| codex r7 M1 | Abstract "Three independent feature-derived scores" | CLOSED | Current prose uses "Three feature-derived scores" and the shared-input caveat at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:37 and :97; §III states the scores are not statistically independent at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:113. |
| codex r7 M2 | §I overclaimed Big-4 scope | CLOSED | Big-4 primary scope is explicit at §III-G, paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:19 and Phase 4 paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:39; corrected M3 language does not invalidate this closure. |
| codex r7 M3 | Stale §III-D cross-reference | CLOSED | Pipeline / validation references now point to §III-L / §III-M / §III-I.4, e.g. paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:29. |
| codex r7 M4 | §I repeated independent-score error | CLOSED | Phase 4 describes internal consistency, not independent validation, at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:37 and :97. |
| codex r7 M5 | §II not submission-ready as standalone | PARTIAL | §II still contains a review-pass note saying only the v4 paragraph is reproduced, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:65. This is a splice-packaging issue. |
| codex r7 M6 | Refs [42]-[44] absent / placeholders | SUPERSEDED | My round-7 claim was wrong against the current reference file: [42]-[44] are present at paper/paper_a_references_v3.md:87-91, and §II cites them at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:67. |
| codex r7 M7 | §V reified CPA mechanism labels | CLOSED | §V now uses descriptor-position language and explicitly rejects latent mechanism classes at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:81 and :93. |
| codex r7 M8 | §V speculative within-CPA unimodality explanation | CLOSED | §V-B restricts the result to composition + integer artefacts, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:81. |
| codex r7 M9 | §V limitations incomplete | CLOSED | §V-H lists nine v4 limitations plus five inherited v3.20.0 limitations at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:111-139. |
| codex r7 M10 | §V full-dataset scope overread | CLOSED | Scope limitation is explicit at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:117 and §IV-K is narrow at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:232-254. |
| codex r7 M11 | §VI overclaimed cross-scope pipeline reproducibility | CLOSED | §VI now limits cross-scope support to K=3/Spearman robustness and leaves full ICCR generalisation to future work, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:147-149. Opus M3 does not reopen this. |
| codex r7 m1 | "candidate classifiers" wording | CLOSED | Current §V-G uses "candidate checks", paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:107. |
| codex r7 m2 | Abstract word-count margin | OPEN | Round-2 M3 rewrite pushed the abstract to 261 words by `wc -w`, while the draft target at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:9 is <=250. |
| codex r7 m3 | Abstract omitted operational output | CLOSED | Abstract includes ICCR units and operational HC+MC per-document alarm, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:11. |
| codex r7 m4 | Contribution 4 overclaimed narrower scopes | CLOSED | Contribution 4 now says the threshold path is unsupported by composition decomposition, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:49. |
| codex r7 m5 | Contribution 8 overclaimed full-dataset check | CLOSED | Current contribution 8 is limited to annotation-free positive-anchor and unsupervised validation ceiling, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:57. |
| codex r7 m6 | "External validation" too broad | CLOSED | Current language is specificity-proxy / annotation-free / unsupervised-ceiling, e.g. paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:57 and :113. |
| codex r7 m7 | §II LOOO sufficiency wording | CLOSED | §II frames LOOO as composition-sensitivity, not operational-classifier sufficiency, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:67. |
| codex r7 m8 | "Inherits and confirms" too strong | CLOSED | §V-B says v4 strengthens/extends by decomposition but does not overclaim direct validation, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:79-81. |
| codex r7 m9 | Firm A byte-level provenance | CLOSED | Inherited Script 28 provenance is stated at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:85 and §III-H at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:37. |
| codex r7 m10 | Firm A alone did not anchor §IV-H | CLOSED | Pixel-identity anchor is Big-4 n=262 with all four firms listed, paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:143-153. |
| codex r7 m11 | "Published box rule" not traceable | CLOSED | Current text uses inherited Paper A / v3.x box rule language, e.g. paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:215. |
| codex r7 m12 | "Same per-CPA ranking" too strong | CLOSED | Residual Firm D/Firm C disagreement is disclosed at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:97 and §IV-F at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:102. |
| codex r7 m13 | §V "candidate classifiers" residue | CLOSED | Replaced with "candidate checks" at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:107. |
| codex r7 m14 | Future-work audit-quality contrast needed caveat | CLOSED | Future work now keeps the Firm A vs B/C/D contrast descriptive, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:149. |
| codex r7 m15 | Conclusion underplayed operational output | CLOSED | §VI opens with five-way classifier and worst-case aggregation, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:145. |
| codex r7 new issue 1 | §II citation gap | SUPERSEDED | Refs [42]-[44] exist at paper/paper_a_references_v3.md:87-91. |
| codex r7 new issue 2 | Stale close-out metadata | OPEN | Phase 4 close-out still says 243-244 words and "§V-G Limitations", paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:157-160; current abstract count is 261 and limitations are §V-H. |
| Gemini M1 | Reject "statistically insignificant" firm heterogeneity framing | CLOSED | Current text says firm effects are large and not pool-size explained at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:259-268 and paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:35. |
| Gemini M2 | codex refs [42]-[44] error | CLOSED | References are present at paper/paper_a_references_v3.md:87-91. |
| Gemini M3 | ICCR disclaimer adequacy | CLOSED | FAR is explicitly reframed as ICCR / specificity proxy at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:185 and paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:159. |
| Gemini M4 | K=3 demotion language | CLOSED for main body | §III-J and §V-D are correct at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:76-90 and paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:89-93. Residual public wording "replicated vs not-replicated" in Table XI is flagged below as minor terminology residue. |
| Gemini M5 | Feature-derived score caveat | CLOSED | Shared-input caveat appears in §III-K, §IV-F, and §V-E: paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:113; paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:79; paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:97. |
| Gemini m1 | Internal draft notes/checklists | OPEN | Present in §III, §IV, and Phase 4: paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:3 and :431-447; paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:3 and :365-374; paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:3 and :153-162. |
| Gemini m2 | Table XV-B vs XIX numbering | CLOSED in public body | Public document-level table is now Table XIX at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:192 and §IV-M cascades through XX-XXVI at :266, :280, :300, :317, :329, :340, :353. Internal notes still stale. |
| Gemini m3 | Word count note | OPEN | The note remains stale at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:157 and the current abstract is over target. |
| Gemini new issue | Table XV sample-size nuance | PARTIAL | A pointer to §III-G was added at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:177, but the footnote misclassifies §IV-M.5 as n=150,442; Script 44 / Tables XXIV-XXV use the 150,453 vector-complete substrate per §III-G, paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:31. |
| Opus M1 | §IV K=3 mechanism-label reversion | CLOSED for named tables/prose; MINOR RESIDUE | Tables IX/X/XIV/XVI/XVII now use descriptor-position or less-replication-dominated language at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:81-100, :145-153, :217-226, :234-254. Public residue: Table XI still says "binary collapse, replicated vs not-replicated" at :104; internal §III open question still says hand-leaning at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:445. |
| Opus M2 | Table XV-B cascade | CLOSED in public body | Table XIX replaces XV-B at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:192 and §IV-M is XX-XXVI at :266-353. No public Table XV-B reference remains; only internal notes at :3 and :370. |
| Opus M3 | "98-100% within source firm" semantic conflation | CLOSED in body; ABSTRACT SHORT FORM | Body locations now separate deployed any-pair 98.8% / 76.7-83.7% from same-pair 97.0-99.96% at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:35, :53, :87, :115, :147, :149 and §III at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:99, :283, :285. The abstract uses a rounded any-pair-only 77-99% headline at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:11, which is not misleading but omits the same-pair subrange. |
| Opus M4 | Duplicate §V-G heading | CLOSED | §V headings now run A-H: paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:73, :77, :83, :89, :95, :99, :105, :109. |
| Opus M5 | Stale "seven limitations" close-out note | OPEN internal | Phase 4 checklist still says "seven limitations" and "§V-G Limitations" at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:160; the actual limitations heading is §V-H and has 14 items. |
| Opus M6 | §IV-M composition table partial vs §III factorial | PARTIAL / LOW | §IV-M.1 remains a summary table at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:266-276, while full factorial detail is in §III-I.4 at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:61-68. This is acceptable if §IV-D points readers to a summary, but current §IV-D says diagnostics are "tabulated in §IV-M" at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:23. |
| Opus M7 | Mixed Spearman precision | OPEN / COPY-EDIT | §III reports 0.963/0.889/0.879 at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:123-127, while §IV uses 0.9627/0.8890/0.8794 at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:81-87. |
| Opus minor 1 | Abstract word-count metadata | OPEN | Current abstract is 261 words; close-out note still says 243-244 at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:157. |
| Opus minor 2 | Internal draft notes | OPEN | Same as Gemini m1. |
| Opus minor 3 | §IV-J Table XV-B pointer | CLOSED in body | Body now says Table XIX at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:228. |
| Opus minor 4 | Mixed decimal / percentage notation | OPEN / COPY-EDIT | Still mixed by design, e.g. 0.34 at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:11 and 33.75% at :33. |
| Opus minor 5 | v3.x §IV-F.1 cross-reference check | OPEN / SPLICE | v3.x §IV-F.1 references remain at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:37 and paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:85. Verify during master splice. |
| Opus minor 6 | Firm A 50/180 inherited provenance | CLOSED / DISCLOSED | Provenance is disclosed as inherited, not regenerated, at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:37. |
| Opus minor 7 | "FAR throughout" historical exception | PARTIAL | v4 framing disclaims FAR, but historical "FAR" appears in paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:159 and paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:185. It is correctly caveated, not an empirical issue. |
| Opus minor 8 | MC band proportions | CLOSED | §IV-J proportions match Table XV rows at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:181-186 and prose at :215. |
| Opus minor 9 | §V-G item count | OPEN internal | Same as Opus M5. |
| Opus minor 10 | LOOO range 1.8-12.8 pp | CLOSED | §IV Table XIII supports 1.76-12.77 pp, paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:131-139. |
| Opus minor 11 | Abstract 98-100 public statement | SUPERSEDED | Replaced by rounded any-pair 77-99% at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:11. |
| Opus new issue 1 | Human-in-the-loop not operationalised | OPEN / COPY-EDIT | The positioning remains in Abstract and §III-M, paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:11 and paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:334, but no concrete review workflow is specified. |
| Opus new issue 2 | Feature-derived caveat breaks down in §IV | CLOSED for main §IV | §IV tables and prose were repaired, except the Table XI binary-collapse label noted above. |
| Opus new issue 3 | §III-M nine-tool table unnumbered | OPEN / COPY-EDIT | The validation table at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:318-329 remains unnumbered. |
| Opus new issue 4 | §I pipeline-step vs framework-element framing | OPEN / COPY-EDIT | The eight-item enumeration remains at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:29. |

## Round-2 induced issues

1. **Abstract now exceeds the target word count.** `sed -n '11p' paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md | wc -w` returns 261. The draft note at paper/v4/paper_a_prose_v4_phase4.md:9 sets an IEEE Access <=250 target, and the close-out note at :157 is stale.

2. **The new Table XV sample-size footnote is partly wrong.** The pointer to §III-G is useful, but paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:177 says §IV-M.5 uses n=150,442. §III-G says Scripts 40b, 43, and 44 use the 150,453 vector-complete substrate, paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:31, and Script 44's report states n_big4_sources = 150,453. Correct the footnote to distinguish descriptor-complete sections from vector-complete §IV-M.2 / §IV-M.3 / §IV-M.5.

3. **Public table cross-reference is stale.** §IV-I still says the consolidated v4-new ICCR calibration appears in "§IV-M Table XVI", paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:161. Current Table XVI is the K=3 firm cross-tab at :217; the ICCR calibration tables are XXI-XXVI at :280, :300, :317, :329, :340, :353.

4. **Internal notes remain stale.** §IV's draft note still says v3.2 and Table XV-B, paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:3; the §IV close-out checklist repeats Table XV-B at :370. §III's internal cross-reference index still says within-firm collision concentration >=97% at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:438 and "C1 hand-leaning" at :445. These are internal-only splice items, not empirical blockers, but they must be stripped or updated.

5. **Minor terminology residue remains outside Opus's named M1 sites.** §III and §IV Table XI still call a K=3 / box-rule binary collapse "replicated vs not-replicated", paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:131 and paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:104. Because this is not the byte-identical positive-anchor ground-truth subset, a stricter v4 wording would be "high-cos / low-dHash vs other positions" or "replication-dominated vs less-replication-dominated."

6. **"Less-replication-dominated" is long but not broken.** The phrase is readable in the public replacement sites. The only sentence I would smooth at copy-edit is paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:215 ("per-CPA less-replication-dominated ranking"), which could become "per-CPA ranking away from the replication-dominated corner."

## Provenance spot-checks

1. **Within-firm any-pair rates from §IV Table XXV.** From paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:340-349:
   - Firm A: 14,447 / 14,622 = 98.8032% -> 98.8%.
   - Firm B: 371 / 484 = 76.6529% -> 76.7%.
   - Firm C: 149 / 178 = 83.7079% -> 83.7%.
   - Firm D: 106 / 137 = 77.3723% -> 77.4%.
   These match the corrected 76.7-98.8% any-pair range and the B/C/D 76.7-83.7% summary. Script 44's report gives the same matrix at /Volumes/NV2/PDF-Processing/signature-analysis/reports/v4_big4/firm_matched_pool/firm_matched_pool_report.md:36-43.

2. **Same-pair joint range 97.0-99.96%.** §III-L.4 reports 11,314/11,319, 85/87, 54/55, and 64/66 at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:281. The arithmetic is 99.9558%, 97.7011%, 98.1818%, and 96.9697%, matching the rounded 99.96% / 97.7% / 98.2% / 97.0%. §IV repeats the rates at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:349.

3. **Pooled Big-4 any-pair per-signature ICCR 0.1102.** Script 43's report gives 16,578 / 150,453 = 0.1102 at /Volumes/NV2/PDF-Processing/signature-analysis/reports/v4_big4/pool_normalized_far/pool_normalized_report.md:42-50. A normal approximation half-width is 1.96 * sqrt(0.1102 * 0.8898 / 150453) = 0.00158, consistent with the reported Wilson [0.1086, 0.1118] in §IV-M.3, paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:300-305.

4. **Per-pair conditional ICCR 0.234.** Script 40b's report gives dHash <= 5 conditional on cos > 0.95 as 70 / 299 = 0.23411 at /Volumes/NV2/PDF-Processing/signature-analysis/reports/v4_big4/inter_cpa_far_sweep/far_sweep_report.md:87-99. This matches §III-L.1 at paper/v4/paper_a_methodology_v4_section_iii.md:208 and §IV-M.2 at paper/v4/paper_a_results_v4_section_iv.md:294.

## Updated round-7 closure reassessment

Opus M3 does not invalidate my round-7 closure of M2 (Big-4 scope language) or M11 (cross-scope pipeline reproducibility). Those findings were about overextending Big-4/full-dataset scope and overclaiming cross-scope reproducibility. The corrected current prose keeps the primary scope Big-4, treats full-dataset evidence as a narrow K=3 + Spearman robustness check, and now reports the within-firm collision pattern as any-pair 76.7-98.8% plus same-pair 97.0-99.96%.

If I re-graded round 7 against the corrected current drafts, none of my major closures would move back to PARTIAL on empirical grounds. I would, however, reopen the abstract word-count minor item because the M3 repair pushed the abstract over the <=250-word target.

## Phase 5 readiness

Partial.

The empirical core is ready: no script rerun or statistical redesign is needed. M2-M4 are closed in manuscript body text, and M3 is substantively corrected. Phase 5 is blocked only by splice/copy-edit/factual-reference hygiene:

1. Trim the abstract from 261 to <=250 words.
2. Correct §IV-J line 177's sample-size footnote so §IV-M.2 / M.3 / M.5 are identified as vector-complete / pair-recomputed analyses, not n=150,442 descriptor-complete analyses.
3. Fix §IV-I's stale "§IV-M Table XVI" pointer.
4. Strip or update internal draft notes, checklists, §III cross-reference index, and stale Table XV-B / >=97% / hand-leaning language.
5. Optionally smooth the residual "replicated vs not-replicated" binary-collapse label and the long "less-replication-dominated" phrase in §IV-J.

## Recommended next-step actions

1. **Copy-edit blocker:** trim the abstract by at least 11 words while preserving the corrected any-pair headline. Do not add same-pair detail to the abstract unless other text is removed.

2. **Factual cross-reference blocker:** replace the §IV-J Table XV footnote with a precise version: descriptor-complete analyses use 150,442; vector/pair-recomputed analyses use 150,453, including Scripts 40b, 43, and 44 (§IV-M.2, M.3, M.5).

3. **Cross-reference blocker:** change §IV-I's "§IV-M Table XVI" to "§IV-M.2 Table XXI" or to "§IV-M Tables XXI-XXVI", depending on whether the intended pointer is per-comparison ICCR only or the whole calibration block.

4. **Splice blocker:** remove all internal notes/checklists before manuscript assembly, especially the stale §IV v3.2 / Table XV-B note, §III's >=97% cross-reference-index shorthand, and the Phase 4 "§V-G Limitations / seven limitations" checklist item.

5. **Terminology cleanup:** consider renaming "binary collapse, replicated vs not-replicated" to descriptor-position language in §III-K and §IV-F, while retaining "replicated class" only for the byte-identical positive-anchor ground truth.
