Unit 4 — Autonomy

The point of an agent is not that it can act without being asked. The point is that a well-defined piece of work can move forward without needing you to restate the context each time. That only works when the system can report what happened and when a person can review it.

Follow the idea

AI That Doesn’t Wait to Be Asked introduces the trigger that lets bounded work begin without another prompt. That changes your role from operator to reviewer, but only if the system has a credible way to check its work. Don’t Grade Your Own Homework explains why verification must be designed separately from execution.

Autonomy is earned when the task is narrow, the work remains visible, and exceptions reliably reach someone capable of making the judgment call.

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