Embodied mineness and background agency: a neurophenomenological approach to the minimal self
Synthese May 28, 2026 DOI: 10.1007/s11229-026-05624-8 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Philosophy of mind |
| Keywords | Embodied cognition Phenomenology philosophy Agency philosophy Metaphysics Dimension graph theory Philosophy of language Orientation vector space Enactivism Epistemology Cognitive science Cognitive psychology Philosophy of science Sense of agency Empirical evidence Neurocognitive Incompatibilism Self Interpretative phenomenological analysis Subjectivism Mind–body problem |
| Key points | Argues that minimal selfhood is fundamentally an embodied and agential phenomenon, with neurocognitive processes of bodily ownership and background agency co-emerging to constitute it. |
Abstract
Abstract The phenomenological concept of minimal selfhood (understood as the pre-reflective dimension of ‘for-me-ness’ or ‘mineness’ that is constitutive of the first-personal character of experience) is often treated as so formal and abstract that it remains neutral regarding embodiment. This paper challenges that view through a neurophenomenological approach that circulates between empirical evidence and phenomenological analysis to argue that minimal selfhood is fundamentally an embodied and agential phenomenon. At the empirical level, evidence from multisensory integration and interoceptive processing reveals that the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying the sense of bodily ownership and presence span across brain and body, grounding the pre-reflective quality of mineness. At the phenomenological level, the lived body is pre-reflectively self-manifest as the zero-point of orientation or an absolute ‘here’ that I argue is inseparable from a practical, outward orientation toward the world. This practical orientation corresponds to what I call background agency: a passive, pre-reflective form of bodily self-awareness that is captured by the phenomenological concept of the ‘I can’, which denotes a form of self-manifestation related to the capacity of engaging in action. Drawing on enactive and dynamical approaches to cognition, I further argue that the neurocognitive processes underlying background agency are entangled with those responsible for bodily ownership and mineness, suggesting that these two structures are co-emergent, giving rise to minimal selfhood. The ‘me’ of for-me-ness, I conclude, is an embodied and agential subjectivity.
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Citations in the library
Cites 16
- Interoceptive inference, emotion, and the embodied self Trends in Cognitive Sciences October 12, 2013
- Minimal self-models and the free energy principle. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience September 12, 2013
- Embodied and Enactive Approaches to Cognition Cambridge University Press eBooks October 31, 2023
- 4E Cognition The Oxford Handbook of 4E Cognition October 9, 2018
- Thin, Thinner, Thinnest: Defining the Minimal Self Embodiment, Enaction, and Culture April 14, 2017
and 11 more in the library