Thermodynamics In The Quantum World Under A Signed Ledger: A −+− / +−+ Contract With Zeros-Stay-Zeros

William Richardson

Published Jan 18, 2026• 0 citations

Abstract

This manuscript reframes a coherence-based “work vs heat” split for coherently driven quantum systems (cavity/laser/atom setting) as a signed-ledger contract that is replayable and falsifiable: each trial is written into {-1,0,+1} with explicit alternation backbones (-+- and +-+) enforced by Strong-to-Weak, missingness handled by STLF triad filtering under a strict zeros-stay-zeros rule, and saturation controlled by SoZ to prevent late-time null tails from being misread as reversibility or “pure work.” The note adds a portability layer via odd-null and sign-flip pairing, supplies a 4S3 leave-one-out control overlay to prevent threshold travel and hidden knob chasing, and specifies minimal token fields (contract_id, corridor_hash, window_hash, seed_hash) so independent reruns can reproduce the same acceptance decisions and falsifiers (flip-only, disable-L, withhold-node, no-test-band).

DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18293905

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