The aim of the research is to show how the way to rethink humanism in the age of technology passes through the analysis of the contradictions that are produced in this social order, focusing on three paradoxical questions:

1. The stronger the enhancement, the more fragilization increases (existential peripheries of ageing, chronic illness, psychic discomfort, anomic individualism, etc.). In erasing archaic forms, "increased" life produces new fragilities.
2. The enhancement is not able to "absorb" all the excess capacity that is produced in social life, in a twofold sense. On the negative side, the available means of enhancement often end up being subservient to latent functions (e.g. violence, exploitation, destruction of the environment, corruption, etc.). For this reason, enhancement cannot be understood as a neutral means at the service of the individual and the debate on the forms and ways of its regulation cannot be quickly dismissed. On the positive side, even when the available means of enhancement are placed at the service of ends that derive from a "humanistic" conception of life, it can be observed that they are not able to exhaust the constitutive surplus of the human being, bringing into play questions to which enhancement is not able to respond.
3. The third question concerns the recognition of precariousness not as an evil to be eradicated but as a constitutive dimension of the human condition: a challenge that is faced by reopening to transcendence and rejecting the claims of reduction within the immanent framework.

Only through a well understood conception of the limit of the human being it is possible to overcome the different forms of exclusive humanism characterizing both the posthuman and transhuman imaginaries and the processes of precariousness. Starting from experiences in which human limits are tested, it is possible to regain an integral look at humanism in the age of technology, to illuminate openings on that transcendence being denied and to discover instructive practices of social generativity.

• Bernabei Roberto - Department of Geriatrics and Orthopaedic Sciences
• Eusebi Luciano - Department of Legal Sciences
• Forti Gabrio - Department of Legal Sciences
• Giaccardi Chiara - Dipartimento di Department of Communication and Performing Arts
• Magatti Mauro - Department of Sociology
• Petrosino Silvano - Dipartimento di Department of Communication and Performing Arts
• Scaratti Giuseppe - Department of Psychology
• Martinelli Monica - Department of Sociology
• Mazzucato Claudia - Department of Legal Sciences
• Galuppo Laura - Department of Psychology
• Gherardi Laura    
• Peja Laura - Dipartimento di Department of Communication and Performing Arts
• Tarantino Matteo - Dipartimento di Department of Communication and Performing Arts
• Visconti Arianna - Department of Legal Sciences
• Cappelletti Patrizia    
• Lampugnani Davide - Department of Sociology
• Silla Cesare
• Fregnan Ezio
• Nicoli Benedetta    
• Ivaldi Silvia    
• Marzetti Emanuele - Department of Geriatrics and Orthopaedic Sciences
• Gardenghi Cristina

Partner:

• Humboldt-universitaet zu Berlin - Germania   
• Institut Catholique de Paris - Francia
• Center for Research on Activity, Development and Learning - University of Helsinki - Finlandia
• University of Tampere - Finlandia
• Pontificia accademia per la vita - Italia

Faculties involved:

• "A. Gemelli" Faculty of Medicine and Surgery
• Faculty of Law
• Faculty of Arts and Philosophy
• Faculty of Political and Social Sciences
• Faculty of Linguistic Sciences and Foreign Literatures
• Faculty of Economics
• Faculty of Education
• Faculty of Psychology