# RP004 — Branching Lineage Protocol v0.1
Question: which distinctions are required for continuation claims under copying, branching and merging?

Cases: G0 linear; G1 copy/original survives; G2 symmetric fork; G3 independent duplicate/same state; G4 merge.

Representations: R0 current state; R1 parent pointer; R2 lineage DAG; R3 typed lineage DAG.

Target separation: current-state equivalence does not automatically determine lineage relation.

Human intuition is not ground truth; no metaphysical identity claim.