The Anthropomorphism Dilemma: Narrating Nonhuman Agency

I believe that mythical stories can help us grasp large, cohesive organizations that possess agency—aka ogregores. However, there’s a wrinkle. Most if not all stories involve human-like characters. On the other hand, ogregores aren’t human and don’t behave like them. Animist narratives which portray non-human agents without using anthropomorphism and psychological research into the causes of anthropomorphism may point a way around the dilemma. 

Ogregores and Agency (Greenbriar 2)

It’s important to understand the nature of organizational agency in order to reckon with the scale and complexity of the institutions shaping public, private, and planetary futures. My thinking has evolved since writing Defining Agency in 2022. It’s time for an update. 

Advertising to AIs

 Agentic AI is a trending term. If the hype comes true, perhaps all that will be left for humans is to buy things. But what if AIs start clicking on ads?

Bad Outcomes make it easier to see group agency

Some say one can’t ascribe agency to organizations. They argue that group agency is just shorthand when we can’t be bothered to detail the motives and actions of all the individuals involved. Cases where a group acts in a way that most if not all its members would disavow make it easier to see collective agency.

Do ogregores give a damn?

Philosopher John Haugeland says that one of the most fundamental differences between human beings and machines is that machines, and AIs in particular, don't give a damn. Things matter to us but not to machines. It’s quite plausible that AIs don’t give a damn, at least not yet. But is that just something that humans can do?

Heidegger's technicity is an agent

Heidegger’s essay “Die Frage nach der Technik” (usually translated as “The Question Concerning Technology”) posits Ge-Stell (variously translated at “enframing,” “pos-ure,” or “positionality”) as the essence of Technik (translated as “technology” or “technicity”; see endnote). Heidegger’s (or his translators’?) pervasive use the passive voice sidesteps the question of whether technicity has agency. I believe this text implies that he believes it does, and that he’s not just using figures of speech.

Is crypto an orgregore?

Jill Dupré raised the question of crypto as an orgregore. Exploring the question helped me think about what an orgregore (aka ogregore or materialist's egregore) is. 

Aristotle, agency, aliveness

Paul Diduch alerted me to Aristotle’s idea that natural things have an internal principle of motion, while human-made artefacts don’t. That made me wonder how agency and contemporary technology relate to an Aristotelian approach.

Defining Agency

Paul Diduch asked me whether I think weather systems like hurricanes have agency. The short answer is “No.” Giving a longer answer allows me to explore what I want the concept of agency to do, since there is no consensus on its definition even within disciplines like computer science or philosophy, let alone between them. 

Degrees of Agency

There are many ways to define agency. The ones I’ve seen provide criteria for deciding whether an entity is or is not an agent. However, once it’s established that something is an agent it would be useful to assess degrees of agenthood. 

Big Tech Blindsight

The emotional invisibility of Big Tech mystifies me. Why don’t I get more worked up about it? I can only speak for myself since I don’t have any survey data, but I suspect it’s not just me.

Corporate entities

This post tries to pull together some of the threads of a conversation with Gabor Molnar and Ramiro Montealegre about orgregores, my term for putatively sentient agents that emerge when large numbers of people are very well connected and have a common purpose. Our discussion focused on corporations.