Content-type: text/html Downes.ca ~ Stephen's Web ~ Autonomy and Identity

Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

Short post on how autonomy and identity go hand in hand. I've argued for autonomy in the past as a core element of successful networks, and it's not hard to see why: "its value lies in creating lives for ourselves, in making up identities, in choosing and pursuing 'conceptions of the good'." But what about cases where identity is determined by nature - whether my DNA says I'm Irish or English, for example. Even here, autonomy plays a role: I can choose to discover the truth of the matter, or not really care either way. Autonomy isn't merely about "whether, or how far, some aspect of our identity is a matter of one's own say-so." It's about defining one's own way of life, whatever one's DNA.

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Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
stephen@downes.ca

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Last Updated: Dec 23, 2024 08:24 a.m.

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