Digital Humanism: A Philosophy for 21st Century Digital Society

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the vulnerability of humanity to viruses and health crises, and digitalization mediates this crisis. Digital Humanism explores how Humanism can help us to critically understand how digital technologies shape society and humanity, providing an introduction to Humanism in the digital age. Fuchs introduces the approach of Digital Humanism and outlines foundations of a Radical Digital Humanism, analyzing what decolonization of academia and the study of the digital, media, and communication means, the roles of robots, automation, and Artificial Intelligence in digital capitalism, and how the communication of death and dying has been mediated by digital technologies, capitalist necropower, and digital capitalism. To save humanity and society, we need Radical Digital Humanism now.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 272 pages
Publication date: 19 September 2022
Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited

Our modern global digital society is not always a pleasant place to live. Authoritarianism, hatred, false news, post-truth culture, the COVID-19 anti-vaccination movement, COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and political polarization are organized via the Internet. The public sphere is highly polarized. Today, many humans tend to think of other humans mainly in terms of friends and enemies. Robots and Artificial Intelligence-based automation have created new challenges for the world of work. Decades of neoliberalism have increased inequalities. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the vulnerability of humanity to viruses and health crises.

Humanity and society are in a major crisis, and digitalization mediates this crisis. Digital Humanism explores how Humanism can help us to critically understand how digital technologies shape society and humanity, providing an introduction to Humanism in the digital age. Fuchs introduces the approach of Digital Humanism and outlines foundations of a Radical Digital Humanism, analyzing what decolonization of academia and the study of the digital, media, and communication means; what the roles are of robots, automation, and Artificial Intelligence in digital capitalism; and how the communication of death and dying has been mediated by digital technologies, capitalist necropower, and digital capitalism. In order to save humanity and society, we need Radical Digital Humanism now.

Weight: 302g
Dimension: 128 x 198 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781803824222