Acts
What it knows is worth nothing if you have to go and find it
This is where a memory falls short. It stores well, sorts well, and then sits waiting for someone to phrase the right question. The second tense is about not waiting.
THE DIFFERENCE
Waiting for the question or arriving with the answer
Before
The agent searches, gets whatever looks most like what it typed, and decides on its own what to trust. That is the same work it had before asking.
Now
What is already solved shows up with the work, not in a separate list. The answer arrives the moment it is needed, which is the only one that counts.
Origin
Each item knows where it came from and how many times it worked. You can decide how much to trust it, which is different from trusting it or not.
Nothing
If there is nothing consolidated on something, the answer is that there is nothing. An honest silence beats a filler result.
WHAT CHANGES IN PRACTICE
What stops happening
Repeat
Nobody solves from scratch what is already solved on another project. That duplicated work shows up nowhere, which is why nobody counts it.
Ask
You stop needing to know the answer exists in order to find it. Searching requires suspecting there is something; acting does not.