Rationalizing flow: agency in skilled unreflective action

Brownstein, Michael

doi:10.1007/s11098-013-0143-5

Cited by 54 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…I just did it.^… Kimberly Kim, the youngest person ever to win the US Women's Amateur Golf Tournament said, BI don't know how I did it. I just hit the ball and it went good.^(Quoted in Brownstein 2014). It may be that athletes infer they are the subejcts of the activity after the fact, but notice that they do not deny their bodily movements as being there own.…”

Section: The Telic Awareness Of Agency In Expert Bodily Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Brownstein argues that if Anscombean questions are central for determining that one is aware of one's agency, but experts cannot answer Anscombean questions, then it appears that there needs to be some other way to account for the agency involved in flow experience. Brownstein (2014) argues that agents engaged in expert bodily actions are not able to answer accurately Bwhat^and Bwhy^questions about their bodily movements. Brownstein outlines three different recent accounts of skilled unreflective action, each of which suggest that athletes are able to answer Anscombean questions (Railton 2009;Annas 2011;Velleman 2008).…”

Section: The Telic Awareness Of Agency In Expert Bodily Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, if I can argue that self-awareness is present in flow experience, then since flow is the apex of expertise, it might be easier to argue for self-awareness in expert bodily action when flow experience is not present. 2 Philosophers (Brownstein 2014;Hoffding 2014; Montero, The Myth of BJust Do It^: thought and effort in expert action, Forthcoming) have argued that flow experience may not be a mark of expertise, but instead that expert bodily action could be understood in terms of situation-specific response of an agent to her environment. While Dreyfus's notion of absorbed bodily coping does include expert bodily action, the range of possible activities is broad and Dreyfus does include everyday examples of tying one's shoes, riding an elevator, and making coffee.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In §1, I outline three distinct features of flow experience relevant to Dreyfus's argument: merging into flow (Schear 2013); immersion in flow (Csikszentmihalyi 1990;Slingerland 2014;De Prycker 2011); emergence from flow (Reitveld 2008;Dreyfus 2013;Brownstein 2014). I argue against Dreyfus's idea that flow experience rules out all types of awareness of agency, while conceding that fluent agency does not involve awareness of agency in a purely thetic sense.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…What makes such activities absorbed bodily coping? There are diverse terms used: 'fluent agency' (Railton 2009); 'unreflective action' (Rietveld 2010, Gottlieb 2011Brownstein 2014); 'skilled activity' (Clarke 2010); 'skilled action' (Annas 2011;Fridland 2014). Dreyfus's phrase 'absorbed bodily coping' is not entirely clear and precise.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Just doing what I do: on the awareness of fluent agency

Dow

2015

Phenom Cogn Sci

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Hubert Dreyfus has argued that cases of absorbed bodily coping show that there is no room for self-awareness in flow experiences of experts. In this paper, I argue against Dreyfus' maxim of vanishing self-awareness by suggesting that awareness of agency is present in expert bodily action. First, I discuss the phenomenon of absorbed bodily coping by discussing flow experiences involved in expert bodily action: merging into the flow; immersion in the flow; emergence out of flow. I argue against the claim that flow experience does not involve an awareness of agency for each of these features, while conceding that fluent agency does not involve self-awareness in the thetic sense. I challenge the assumption that the awareness of fluent agency must be understood in terms of a thetic awareness of agency. Instead, I develop an Anscombean account of the awareness of fluent agency in terms of the phenomenal character of knowing one's aims. I respond to the challenge that if an Anscombean account of the awareness of agency is to succeed, then agents must be able to answer Anscombean questions. I consider the objection that awareness of agency is not a form of self-awareness by outlining an account of self-awareness as self-synthesis that is distinct from self-perception and selfascription, but which makes room for self-awareness in expert bodily action.

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Section: The Telic Awareness Of Agency In Expert Bodily Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Telic Awareness Of Agency In Expert Bodily Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Just doing what I do: on the awareness of fluent agency

Dow

2015

Phenom Cogn Sci

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Motor Intentions and Non-Observational Knowledge of Action

Blomberg

Brozzo

2017

Thought: A Journal of Philosophy

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According to the standard story given by reductive versions of the Causal Theory of Action, an action is an intrinsically mindless bodily movement that is appropriately caused by an intention. Those who embrace this story typically take this intention to have a coarse‐grained content, specifying the action only down to the level of the agent's habits and skills. Markos Valaris (2015) argues that, because of this, the standard story cannot make sense of the deep reach of our non‐observational knowledge of action. He concludes that we therefore have to jettison its conception of actions as mindless bodily movements animated from the outside by intentions. Here we defend the standard story. We can make sense of the reach of non‐observational knowledge of action once we reject the following two assumptions: (i) that an intended habitual or skilled action is a so‐called basic action—that is, an action that doesn't involve any finer‐grained intentions—and (ii) that an agent, in acting, is merely executing one intention rather than a whole hierarchy of more or less fine‐grained intentions. We argue that (i) and (ii) are false.

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Habitual Weakness

Silver¹

2019

Thought: A Journal of Philosophy

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The standard case of weakness of will involves a strong temptation leading us to reconsider or act against our judgments. Here, however, I consider cases of what I call ‘habitual weakness’, where we resolve to do one thing yet do another not to satisfy any grand desire, but out of habit. After giving several examples, I suggest that habitual weakness has been under‐discussed in the literature and explore why. These cases are worth highlighting for their ubiquity, and I show three further advantages of appreciating habitual weakness as a kind of weakness: It challenges purportedly necessary conditions on akrasia, it side‐steps outstanding skeptical concerns, and it provides a new model for considering the weak‐willed behavior of group agents. I conclude by arguing that cases of habitual weakness are genuine cases of akrasia and weakness of will. Rather than lacking strength of will, habitual weakness involves lacking diligence, vigilance, or fortitude.

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Rationalizing flow: agency in skilled unreflective action

Cited by 54 publications

References 46 publications

Just doing what I do: on the awareness of fluent agency

Just doing what I do: on the awareness of fluent agency

Motor Intentions and Non-Observational Knowledge of Action

Habitual Weakness

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