What Becomes of a Human Individual in the Twenty First Century? Questions and Hypotheses

Kazimierz KRZYSZTOFEK

Katedra Socjologii, Instytut Nauk Społecznych, Uniwersytet SWPS, ul. Chodakowska 19/31, 03-815 Warsaw, Poland , Poland

Abstract

The author scrutinizes two issues concerning the condition of the human being in the period of post-industrial social change incorporating, in particular, the digital turn. Firstly: To what extent a twenty first century human being still is—or has a chance to be—a person in the sense worked out by philosophy, anthropology and other social sciences, namely, a being which is distinct from the worlds of objects and nature? Secondly: What becomes of the human individual as a social being, and to what extent does a human individual still preserve her social nature? Can we still speak of a human society, or should we rather be speaking about threats to its very existence? Are we still dealing with a society, or rather with an unspecified post-society whose members are both human and non-human actors? The author focuses on the latter aspect of the problem, addressing above all the question of who homo digitalis is.

Translated by Dorota Chabrajska

Keywords:

person, individual, individualization, individuation, post-modernity, digital turn