Technikfolgenabschätzung trifft Anthropologie: Technik, Technikfolgen und die Frage nach dem Menschen

Technology assessment (TA) and philosophical anthropology are rarely explicitly linked. TA, as a sober investigation and assessment of the potential consequences of today’s technological advancements and the resulting policy and social advice, seems far removed from the anthropological question of what it means to be human. However, thematic overlaps have gradually emerged over the past two decades. Through debates on human enhancement, genetic editing, artificial intelligence, and the Anthropocene, the relationship between technology and humanity – and thus the question of what it means to be human amid rapid technological advancement – has also become a topic of TA. This article brings together several developments to draw conclusions regarding the philosophical anthropological dimension of TA, conceptually, thematically, and methodologically.