Three test gates can each return a defensible answer and still leave you with no verdict.

Property checks say fail. The fixture lock says the measurement instrument moved. The flake list says this node is frozen until Thursday. Individually each signal is honest; combined, they invite the worst reflex in CI: rerun until something looks green.

The fix is not a better gate. It is a precedence order, written down before you have a conflict, plus one invariant that survives every future gate you add: no combination of non-clean signals may produce an accept.

Why order has to be fixed in advance

When a gate conflict is resolved after the results are visible, the resolution is chosen by the person who wants the merge. That is selection bias with extra steps, and it is invisible in the log because the log only records the final verdict.

A precedence table moves the choice upstream.…