The term ‘act’ occupies a remarkably varied position across the depth-psychology corpus, functioning simultaneously as an ontological category, a therapeutic imperative, a grammatical phenomenon, and a mythological event. Plotinus treats Act as the very mode of being proper to the Intellectual-Principle—determinate energy issuing from an otherwise indeterminate source—and asks whether the Supreme itself can be said to ‘have’ an Act without thereby fracturing its unity. Ricoeur inherits this Aristotelian legacy (act versus power) and deploys it within a phenomenology of agency, insisting that ‘act,’ ‘acting,’ and ‘action’ share an analogical unity that resists reduction to either mere event or bare causality. Simondon pushes further: the act is neither matter nor form but ‘becoming in the process of becoming,’ embedded in an ethical network of mutual resonance rather than a linear chain of normative inference. Against these speculative registers, Harris’s Acceptance and Commitment Therapy recasts ‘act’ as a behaviorally observable orientation—toward or away from values—making the quality of the act inseparable from its motivational context. Benveniste, meanwhile, recovers the performative and authoritative dimensions of the act in Indo-European linguistics, showing that certain utterances are acts rather than descriptions. What unites these perspectives is a shared insistence that acts cannot be adequately theorized as isolated events; they require a field—ontological, ethical, relational, or psychological—to acquire their significance.
The act is neither matter nor form, it is becoming in the process of becoming, it is being to the extent that this being is, by becoming.
Simondon locates the act within a process ontology, rejecting both formal and material reduction and situating ethical value in the relational network acts form through mutual resonance rather than normative abstraction.
, Individuation in Light of Notions of Form and Information, 2020thesis
Does not this unity belong to the metacategory of being as act and as power? And does not the ontological significance of this metacategory preserve what we have already termed on several occasions the analogical unity of action
Ricoeur connects the Aristotelian distinction of act and power to a phenomenology of selfhood, arguing that the polysemic unity of human action is sustained by this ontological metacategory.
, Oneself as Another, 1992thesis
Even if there be Act in the Supreme—an Act with which it is to be identified—this is not enough to set up a duality within it and prevent it being entirely master of that self from which the Act springs; for the Act is not distinct from that self.
Plotinus argues that the Supreme’s Act is identical with its being, precluding any duality between subject and activity—a position that grounds his emanationist ontology.
, The Six Enneads, 270thesis
the Act of the Intellectual-Principle is intellection, which means that, seeing the intellectual object towards which it has turned, it is consummated, so to speak, by that object, being in itself indeterminate like sight
Plotinus defines the Intellectual-Principle’s Act as intellection—a self-consummating movement toward its object—distinguishing it from the self-sufficient simplicity of the One above it.
, The Six Enneads, 270thesis
in order to determine what counts as an action (the question ‘what?’), one sought in the explanation for the action (the question ‘why?’) the very criterion for what deserves to be described as an action.
Ricoeur traces how the analytic philosophy of action collapsed descriptive and explanatory questions together, risking the dissolution of personal agency into impersonal causality.
, Oneself as Another, 1992supporting
the phenomenon of ascription constitutes, in the final analysis, only a partial and as yet abstract determination of what is meant by the ipseity (the selfhood) of the self.
Ricoeur argues that ascribing an act to an agent is insufficient for a full account of selfhood; the power to act must be owned as one’s own for ipseity to be established.
, Oneself as Another, 1992supporting
Are both Acts and motions to be included in the category of Action, with the distinction that Acts are momentary while Motions, such as cutting, are in time?
Plotinus interrogates the categorical distinction between Acts (instantaneous) and Motions (durational), questioning whether both fall under a single genus of Action or require separate ontological treatment.
, The Six Enneads, 270supporting
it’s not about the activity we’re doing; it’s about the effects that activity is having. In contexts where an activity takes us toward the life we want, behaving like the person we want to be, it’s a towards move
Harris redefines the moral valence of an act in ACT therapy as context-dependent and values-oriented, decoupling the identity of an action from its surface form.
, ACT Made Simple: An Easy-To-Read Primer on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, 2009supporting
le performatif, étant un acte, a cette propriété d’être unique. Il ne peut être effectué que dans des circonstances particulières, une fois et une seule, à une date et en un lieu définis.
Benveniste establishes the performative utterance as an act in the strict sense—singular, unrepeatable, and constitutive of a new situation—distinguishing it from merely constative description.
, Problèmes de linguistique générale, I, 1966supporting
The action designated by the verb is always exercised as an act of authority, applied downward. Only the god has the capability of kraínein, which indicates not the actual execution but (1) the acceptance by the god of the wish formulated by the man
Benveniste demonstrates that in archaic Greek the act of divine authorization (kraínein) is structurally prior to any empirical execution, locating the efficacy of acts in a hierarchy of sovereign power.
, Indo European Language and Society, 1973supporting
In the act of killing, Actaion responds and corresponds to this focusing. With the appearance of the stag, there is only the here and now for him
Giegerich reads the mythological act of killing as a total self-coincidence of subject and essence, where the figure’s act is not chosen but is the very form of his being.
, The Soul’s Logical Life Towards a Rigorous Notion of, 2020supporting
As one whose essence it is to be a hunter, Actaion has no choice, there are no alternatives for him. He cannot be diverted and, e.g., indulge in voyeurism, forgetting about his original purpose.
Giegerich argues that mythological figures enact their essence necessarily, collapsing the distinction between act and identity in a way that illuminates depth-psychological notions of compelled behavior.
, The Soul’s Logical Life Towards a Rigorous Notion of, 2020supporting
ACT doesn’t achieve this by challenging, disputing, disproving, or invalidating thoughts; nor does it help people to avoid, suppress, distract from, dismiss
Harris clarifies that ACT’s transformation of acting and thinking operates through acceptance and defusion rather than cognitive disputation, reframing what constitutes effective therapeutic action.
, ACT Made Simple: An Easy-To-Read Primer on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, 2009supporting
still, having no sensation and not expressing his virtue in act, how can he be happy?
Plotinus entertains an objection that happiness requires virtue expressed in act, using this to probe the relationship between conscious expression and inner felicity in his ethics of the Sage.
, The Six Enneads, 270aside
nous indiquions sommairement la différence entre je jure, qui est un acte, et il jure, qui n’est qu’une information.
Benveniste illustrates the performative/constative distinction through first- versus third-person verbal forms, showing that subjectivity in language is constitutive of the act itself.
, Problèmes de linguistique générale, I, 1966aside
more able to take effective action in the face of emotional discomfort; more able to engage fully in what they’re doing
Harris summarizes psychological flexibility in ACT as the capacity for values-directed action even amid distressing internal states.
, ACT Made Simple: An Easy-To-Read Primer on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, 2009aside