The Place of Human Beings in the Infosphere

On the Possibility of a New Philosophical Anthropology

Abstract

On the basis of the philosophical tradition of the last century, we can define philosophical anthropology as that discipline which adopts a philosophical reflection on the human being based on scientific knowledge and beyond any metaphysical–theological vision, in order to offer a plausible view of the “place” occupied by human beings in nature (in being) and, contextually, a theoretical basis for their ethical orientation. The place determined and occupied by human beings in the cosmos is to be understood as a free and continuous action on the context and as an interaction between the subjects involved (nature included). The issue of the infosphere can be dealt with as an issue of philosophical anthropology. In the case of the “place” of the human being in the infosphere there is, indeed, the risk that the context created is such as to progressively limit the freedom of the agents involved, who would no longer have an open world (Welt) in front of them in which it is possible to act freely, but rather an environment (Umwelt) to which one must necessarily (and simply) react. The challenge is to think and ethically design the infosphere while constantly keeping the conditions open for a free “positioning” of human beings and therefore for an action not necessarily bound by the context.