LAUSR

Within the passages of a laudable attempt to provide a framework via which some clarity can be brought to questions regarding the ways in which differing aspects or “dimensions” of agency are interconnected and mutually influential, the authors of “Mapping the Dimensions of Agency” (Sch€ onau et al. 2021) make the claim that, as one of these aspects, a notion of “(a)uthenticity is central to human agency” (176), and that the feeling we associate with agency (that our actions are, indeed, effectual) becomes somewhat illusive and perhaps alienating if our sense of self suffers from some form of discontinuity in light of this reliance. Facing a problematic concept, the authors do well to provide a definition of authenticity from which they construct their framework, i.e., “the ability to reflect on one’s past, envision one’s future, and work to align one’s actions with this vision while preserving continuity” (176). Yet, under an embedded understanding of agency, one that allows for broader ethical consideration via the inclusion of non-intentional action, it does not require these. Roughly, an embodied/embedded/enactive account of agency attaches itself to a long line of reasoning in the philosophy of mind that sees consciousness as part of its environment, as opposed to a “detached observer” that operates on its environment, as if individuated from it (Demski and Garrabrant 2019; Dreyfus 2002). Indeed, agency does not require a corresponding mental representation at all, and thus does not require an experience of authenticity, as defined. That is, at least as presented, authenticity is not central to agency when agency is understood as constituted by both intentional as well as non-intentional causal relations between agents and events. Certainly, a notion of authenticity as it relates to conscious experience will inherently lend itself to ethical considerations. Nevertheless, a much broader realm of ethical considerations surrounding agency can be realized when agency is understood as instantiated, even in the absence of a corresponding mental representation (i.e., non-intentional). For the purposes of this writing, I refer to non-intentional actions/effects as those which cannot be verified to be causally associated with an appropriately corresponding mental representation at all (i.e., in the absence of mental representation), as opposed to unintentional actions/effects, meaning the effects were simply not anticipated by the action’s corresponding mental representation.