title: Agency Is Frame-Dependent
summary: Agency is a system's capacity to steer outcomes toward a goal, and is a
  central topic of study across biology, philosophy, cognitive science, and
  artificial intelligence. Determining if a system exhibits agency is a
  notoriously difficult question: Dennett (1989), for instance, highlights the
  puzzle of determining which principles can decide whether a rock, a thermostat,
  or a robot each possess agency. We here address this puzzle from the viewpoint
  of reinforcement learning by arguing that agency is fundamentally
  frame-dependent: Any measurement of a system's agency must be made relative to
  a reference frame. We support this claim by presenting a philosophical argument
  that each of the essential properties of agency proposed by Barandiaran et al.
  (2009) and Moreno (2018) are themselves frame-dependent. We conclude that any
  basic science of agency requires frame-dependence, and discuss the implications
  of this claim for reinforcement learning.
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d20
paper_authors.name: David Abel
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d21
paper_authors.name: André Barreto
paper_authors.status: admin_assigned
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paper_authors.fullname: Andre Barreto
paper_authors.type: user
paper_authors.user: andrebarreto
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d22
paper_authors.name: Michael Bowling
paper_authors.status: admin_assigned
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paper_authors.fullname: Michael Bowling
paper_authors.type: user
paper_authors.user: Alkaroth
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d23
paper_authors.name: Will Dabney
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d24
paper_authors.name: Shi Dong
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d25
paper_authors.name: Steven Hansen
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d26
paper_authors.name: Anna Harutyunyan
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d27
paper_authors.name: Khimya Khetarpal
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d28
paper_authors.name: Clare Lyle
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paper_authors._id: 6313f69d54e6e5d9f0fb9f10
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paper_authors.fullname: Clare Lyle
paper_authors.type: user
paper_authors.user: justclarifying
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d29
paper_authors.name: Razvan Pascanu
paper_authors.status: admin_assigned
paper_authors.statusLastChangedAt: 2025-02-10T16:13:44.165Z
paper_authors._id: 64b9310403124195cd9778ec
paper_authors.avatarUrl: /avatars/57c594d3d0f97d3010b15b6a0806451c.svg
paper_authors.fullname: Razvan Pascanu
paper_authors.type: user
paper_authors.user: razp
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2a
paper_authors.name: Georgios Piliouras
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2b
paper_authors.name: Doina Precup
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2c
paper_authors.name: Jonathan Richens
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2d
paper_authors.name: Mark Rowland
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2e
paper_authors.name: Tom Schaul
paper_authors._id: 67a97c7542d4d2f92ee57d2f
paper_authors.name: Satinder Singh
paper_title: Agency Is Frame-Dependent
paper_summary: Agency is a system's capacity to steer outcomes toward a goal, and is a
  central topic of study across biology, philosophy, cognitive science, and
  artificial intelligence. Determining if a system exhibits agency is a
  notoriously difficult question: Dennett (1989), for instance, highlights the
  puzzle of determining which principles can decide whether a rock, a thermostat,
  or a robot each possess agency. We here address this puzzle from the viewpoint
  of reinforcement learning by arguing that agency is fundamentally
  frame-dependent: Any measurement of a system's agency must be made relative to
  a reference frame. We support this claim by presenting a philosophical argument
  that each of the essential properties of agency proposed by Barandiaran et al.
  (2009) and Moreno (2018) are themselves frame-dependent. We conclude that any
  basic science of agency requires frame-dependence, and discuss the implications
  of this claim for reinforcement learning.
paper_ai_keywords: reinforcement learning frame-dependent