Infosphere, Humans as Inforgs, and Human Agency

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to shed light on the nature of the information revolution we are facing by focusing on Floridi’s philosophy of information, specifically his book The Fourth Revolution. I will first briefly explain the concepts of hyperhistory and the infosphere, and then identify the core claim of the Fourth Revolution in anthropology, along with the concept of the “inforg.” Copernicus, Darwin, and Freud each contributed in different ways to the rupture of anthropocentrism and the decentering of the human subject. In Floridi’s Fourth Revolution, the decentering of the human subject is related to the fact that we understand ourselves as inforgs, or information organisms. Focusing on the role of technology in mediating the relationship between human perception (experience), action, and reality (the world), I argue that the decentering of the human subject in the Fourth Revolution can be found in a shift in our perception of human agency.