So... have been playing and having fun... I have seen some various problems (like sometimes I cannot activate VATS or problems with rads, or whatever else) but mostly I have either been able to ignore them or restart the game or fiddle with things and keep on playing. I do not know why these things happen - maybe it's bugs in the game engine, maybe it's one of those way-too-prevalent sponsored malware infections, maybe it's a consequence of one of those rare hardware failures, but mostly my problems have been things I could tolerate.

Until... one of my provisioners has turned hostile. And stays that way. I can be in workshop mode and see that this is one of my provisioners, but of course I cannot reassign them anywhere. And of course, provisioners are immortal.

Does anyone have any ideas of how to recover from something like this?

Sounds like you'd possibly have to use console command for this.

Console command kill him, then aim at him and revive him/her.

Hopefully this could reset the code.

I have explored that game further, and all of sanctuary (including Codsworth, but not including the dog) has also turned hostile. So I expect that something deeper is wrong than just that one provisioner.

I have considered reverting to a previous save, but the most recent save I have which is older than the one I was exploring loses six hours off my character. And if I am going to do that, I almost feel like I should start over. But if the game or my machine is this flakey, it's sort of like "what's the point"?

I guess, though, that I have plenty of other games I can play, and also that maybe at some point in the future i can try this one again...

But thank you for the suggestion.

I threw a grenade at a super mutant, provisioner happened to be close by, provisioner angry(justifiabe). Could be that.

I haven't been using grenades.