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ABSTRACT
Agency, the theme of my life’s work, consists of efficacy, future-minded optimism, and imagination. I here attempt to trace the history of agency in Western thought over the Greco-Roman epoch. The Iliad presents mortals without any agency, the gods having it all; whereas in the Odyssey, humans have considerable agency, and the gods less. Later, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus and the Stoics postulate full-blown human agency. The emphasis on will, responsibility, and choice continues through early Christianity and then is renounced by Augustine in the fourth century, CE, with human agency relegated to being grace, a gift from God. Human progress seems linked to these beliefs, with strong human agency beliefs linked to progress and weak human agency beliefs linked to stagnation.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. When I was first writing about Positive Psychology and its emphasis on PERMA (Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning and Achievement), one of my California friends wrote and asked me ‘Marty, what are you smoking? Out here all we care about is sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll.’
2. I lean heavily on Lang (Citation2015), Chapter 3, Bodies, Souls and the Perils of Persuasion.
3. I lean heavily on Frede (Citation2012), Chapter 2: Aristotle on Choice without a Will.
4. Nichomachean Ethics, Book 3, Chapter 5.
5. Nichomachean Ethics, Book 1, especially Chapter 8.
6. The masculine pronoun here is not accidental.
7. Frede (Citation2012). Chapter 6.
8. Frede (Citation2012), Chapter 6 is a useful and very detailed analysis of Augustine’s renunciation of human agency.