Title: On the rise of posthuman visions and how they are transforming anthropology of technology

Short description:New technologies and the environmental crisis are transforming what it means to be human. They challenge the role of the human being – especially in relation to the non-human –and call for new anthropological reflections. In this context, various visions of the so-called "posthuman" are emerging.

First, there are transhumanist and ideological visions of the posthuman that aim to radically transform or even overcome the human through technology. Second, there are approaches within new materialism (e.g., Haraway, Barad), the ethics of technology, and environmental philosophy that propose a posthuman understanding – not as a technological upgrade, but as a shift toward a non-anthropocentric and critical reconsideration of humanism.

In this talk, I will explore these different versions of the posthuman and examine how they contribute to the transformation of anthropology. The rise of the posthuman signals and marks a broader rethinking of the human and of anthropological thought itself. But in what direction is this rethinking heading? How is anthropology being transformed? I will discuss relational and more-than-human approaches in the anthropology of technology that seek to challenge anthropocentrism and to rethink human–non-human relations.

Puzio, Anna: Über-Menschen. Philosophische Auseinandersetzung mit der Anthropologie des Transhumanismus. Book. Transcript 2022.

Puzio, Anna: The entangled human being – a new materialist approach to anthropology of technology. In AI Ethics (2024).

Puzio, Anna: Not Relational Enough? Towards an Eco-Relational Approach in Robot Ethics. In Philosophy & Technology (2024).

Bio: 

Dr. Anna Puzio studied Theology, Philosophy, and German Language and Literature in Münster and Munich. She earned her PhD in Munich with a dissertation on the human conception in transhumanism. After conducting research and working in Frankfurt, Vienna, Oxford, and Cambridge, she is now a researcher in ethics and the anthropology of technology at the University of Twente in the Netherlands, as part of the Dutch research programme Ethics of Socially Disruptive Technologies. She is currently a visiting researcher at the University of California, Berkeley. Her other research focuses include new materialism (especially Donna Haraway and Karen Barad), diversity, medical ethics, environmental ethics, and the intersection of religions and AI.
www.anna-puzio.com
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Anna-Puzio?ev=hdr_xprf

https://www.linkedin.com/in/anna-puzio-a64018198/