Defining attention as action-catalyzer reduces attentional life to a cascade of incitements

Evidence

But on the whole, this formulation is rigid and mechanistic. If awareness is not attention until we act upon it, then our attentional life is therefore only ever a cascade of incitements. Davenport and Beck’s account sets aside the question of “what attention can be” and replaces it with an always-already-instrumentalized definition: Attention is a task-directed TOOL. To be used. It is reflex and trigger. Track and click. — The Friends of Attention, Attensity!, 63