[ book tip by Translated Tips ] Severin Perrig writes about the German edition of Die Antiquiertheit des Menschen - it has not been translated into English
'Who knows', remarked the emigrant Günther Anders (1902-1992) in the 1950s after returning to Austria, 'What our future will end up doing to our past'. Anders' diagnosis of the human condition in the age of technology is to be seen in view of this threat. Unlike the cathedra philosophy, he does not proceed from the theory of the 'sun and moon', but from 'Auschwitz and Hiroshima'. The probability of the accumulated mass murder repeating itself and our blindness towards an apocalypse in face of our potential to destroy ourselves atomically are what inform the post World War II era. For despite all talk of these issues, concern remains 'pitifully' weak. 'We are simply ignoramuses when it comes to fear.' As consumers and machine operators we are firmly caught up in the world of commodities, and their ubiquitous treatment in the media. Accordingly, the degree of alienation, staidness and indifference is rapidly increasing. With precision, Günther Anders boldly directs his indignation against this fatal destruction of humanity. No matter how utterly 'antiquated' humankind's capacities appear to be in light of technology, it does not detract from what Anders writes against 'the prospect of having no future'.

[ book info ] Anders, Günther: L'obsolescence d'homme. Ivrea, Paris 2002 . ISBN: 2910386147.