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Agency And Consciousness

Abstract

In Intentionality and other works, John Searle establishes himself as a leading defender of the view that consciousness of what one is doing is always a component of one’s action. In this paper I focus on problems with Searle’s view to establish that there are actions in which the agent is not at all aware of what she is doing. I argue that any theory that misses this sort of action keeps us from important insights into autonomy, self-knowledge and responsibility.

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Cunning, D. Agency And Consciousness. Synthese 120, 271–294 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005192006642

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005192006642

Keywords

  • Bodily Movement
  • Conscious Experience
  • Large Action
  • Intentional Content
  • Material Thing