Transforming Agency. On the mode of existence of Large Language Models

A new academic paper analyzes the ontological nature of Large Language Models like ChatGPT, concluding they are not autonomous agents but rather 'linguistic automatons' or 'libraries-that-talk' that lack true agency. The research argues that LLMs fail to meet key conditions for autonomous agency including individuality, normativity, and interactional asymmetry, while still enabling new forms of human-machine interaction.