Toward a General Model of Agency
Issue: Issue 16 • Author/s: Emanuele Martinelli
Topics: Epistemology, Metaethics, Moral Philosophy, Philosophy of action
Generally speaking, the present literature on agency has been heavily focused on human agency. This approach proves to be very useful for the immediate applications of the philosophy of agency, e.g. to develop a definition ready for use in ethics or political philosophy. However, there are some limitations to this line of thought, as, for instance, it poses too restrictive requirements on agency, like purposefulness, consciousness, or willingness. In this paper, I would like to tackle the question of agency with the need to include non-human agency in mind. I…