> One's observations of one's own agency is really the only thing one can be assured of. Can one? One of the most disturbing short stories I've ever read is "L

> One's observations of one's own agency is really the only thing one can be assured of. Can one? One of the most disturbing short stories I've ever read is "Love Is the Plan, the Plan Is Death" by Alice Sheldon (writing as James Tiptree). It is the first-person narrative of an unusually self-aware member of a non-technological intelligent species trying to make a life different from "the plan", the species' instincts, in the face of an oncoming slow-motion multigenerational catastrophe. His efforts end up, all for contextually rational and agentive reasons, reiterating his species instinctual lifecycle. My takeaway from that, from other readings, and from self reflection, is that we are puppets that may or may not become aware of our strings; but if we cut them, we die.