Just to elaborate on my thought process, and please...if I'm off base feel free to chime in. I'm going on instinct and drawing conclusions based on information and not experience.
Let's make a couple of assumptions...based on a reputable curing guide, here is a snippet:
"Below 55% RH - the RH is too low for the curing process to take place. The product starts to feel brittle. Once you've hit this point, nothing will make it better.
Adding moisture won't restart the curing process; it will just make the product wet."
So I don't want to debate that statement, but let's assume that if a bud is dried to much and ends up being under 55% when it hits the jar that no curing will occur.
With that logic, I propose the following questions to you guys:
When a bud is hanging during the 1st few days of drying, at some point the moisture of the exterior should equal or at least be very close to whatever the moisture content in the room is, right? While the inner portions of the bud will contain more moisture. If we are to believe that sub 55% will render material incapable of cure, then doesn't it sound reasonable that the outer layers of material have been compromised and that by placing the bud into a paper bag, or jar, or whatever in order to redistribute the moisture, that the exterior portions of the bud have already been compromised and that by allowing them to gain moisture from the wetter interior of the bud, all we have really done is gotten the exterior wet again.
Is it possible that by letting the exterior of the bud deviate dramatically from the interior of the bud in regard to moisture, that ultimately a cure will really only be curing the interior of the bud as the exterior breached 55% and is therefor compromised?
This is how I have been thinking about *drying* and is why I was posing my earlier questions.