[GMontag]

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This is a irrelevant point. Anytime an individual is "acting", it can only act insofar as the component organs that compose the individual act, yet you seem to have no problem treating the individual as a whole. Collectives are no different than individuals, just another level of abstraction up. The insistence of looking at the situation at one arbitrary level of abstraction (that of the human being) is irrational.

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The components that compose an individual don't act though--they aren't purposeful creatures using means to attain ends. I am not trying to sidestep the fact that individuals, too, are collections of chemicals, atoms, etc--but it isn't relevant when discussing action (i.e., purposeful behavior). When discussing motives, ethics, goals, etc, individuals (and not the components that compose them, nor the collectives that the individuals compose) are the primary actors.

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The components most certainly do act. In what way is a white blood cell attacking a foreign body, or a nerve cell contracting a muscle cell any less purposeful than anything a human does? Perhaps you'd like to illuminate your definition of "purposeful".