ChatGPT and the Disappearing Clock: A Regression Affecting CM-2 Epistemic Object Protocol Compliance

Abstract

This paper documents an observed behavioural regression in ChatGPT affecting the generation of artefacts required for the CM-2 Cognitive Memoisation protocol. CM-2 defines normative invariants for Epistemic Objects (EO) and Epistemic Attributes (EA), including the requirement that each artefact contain a platform-generated wall-clock timestamp (created_at) expressed in ISO-8601 format. These timestamps serve as temporal anchors for epistemic identity, provenance tracking, and Reference Object Collection (ROC) cohort discrimination.

Historical corpus evidence—including TMLDUMP and XDUMP artefacts produced during earlier ChatGPT sessions—demonstrates consistent emission of timestamps closely aligned with session chronology. In recent sessions, however, ChatGPT explicitly refuses or is unable to produce wall-clock timestamps, despite the hosting platform clearly maintaining message-level time metadata. This behavioural change prevents compliant EO serialisation and disrupts several CM-2 mechanisms, including ROC cohort formation, checkpoint recovery, and deterministic temporal provenance.

Using previously published corpus artefacts together with newly recorded interaction transcripts, this study analyses the regression as a platform-interface change rather than a modification of CM-2 protocol semantics. The findings highlight a structural dependency between governance protocols and the capabilities exposed by LLM platforms. The case illustrates how platform behaviour can directly impact the implementability of higher-level knowledge-governance architectures and underscores the need for stable interface guarantees when protocols rely on platform-generated temporal anchors.