With the publication of the first English translation of influential German philosopher Günther Anders’s 1956 masterpiece of critical theory, The Obsolescence of the Human, a new generation of readers can now engage with his prescient and haunting vision of a “world without us” dominated by technology. Looking at technological events such as the detonation of the nuclear bomb and the arrival of televisions in our living rooms, Anders advances a warning of what humanity looks like in a world where it has surrendered all agency. He outlines the new emotional landscapes that shape our relationship to increasingly capable technology, including Promethean shame, the human sense of unease our own superior technological innovations can instill. Confronting the growing gap between what we can collectively create and what we can individually comprehend, Anders speculates on the trajectory of a developing technological world that rapidly exceeds our ability to control or even foresee its negative consequences. This event brings together four leading scholars of Anders’ work to discuss the remarkable relevance of Anders’ ideas to our present.

Elke Schwarz is a Senior Lecturer in Political Theory at Queen Mary University London. Her research focuses on the intersection of ethics of war and technology with an emphasis on unmanned and autonomous / intelligent military technologies and their impact on the politics of contemporary warfare.

Christian Dries is the head of the Günther Anders Research Centre at the University of Freiburg. His main topics of work include social philosophy, cultural sociology, technology and digitalisation, the Anthropocene and the apocalypse.

Chris Müller is is a lecturer in Cultural Studies & Media at Macquarie University, Sydney, and a Honorary Research Associate in Critical and Cultural Theory at Cardiff University, UK. His research focuses on the intersection of technology, cultural politics and affect.

Jacob Blumenfeld is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Social Critique at Humboldt University Berlin. His research areas are critical theory, German Idealism, property, and climate change.

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THE PHILOSOPHER

Published since 1923