Change Without Adjudicative Immunity: Dialectics, Reflexive Social Objects, and Versioned Inquiry

Social theories, classifications, metrics, and policies can change the objects they describe, while evaluative standards can also shift after outcomes appear. This paper asks how such inquiry can remain revisable without becoming immune to failure. It introduces local adjudicative invariance: within a bounded round, load-bearing empirical and normative commitments remain stable unless the round is explicitly closed or invalidated. A worked predictive-policing case shows how reflexive feedback can alter evidence generation and normative purpose. The framework supplements dialectical and reflexive social theory by distinguishing predecessor verdicts from successor revisions, and moral learning from outcome-dependent normative accommodation.