The article starts from the thesis that the concept of humanity is one of the few capable of providing
an overall orientation in contemporary reality. If this is true, then it is necessary to renew the
humanism. To this aim, a brief reconstruction of modern humanism and its predominant anthropological
model is proposed: a model of human ambiguity and finitude, which includes contradictory
characters and is, therefore, far from triumphant or pacifying. On the basis of this
model, the shortcomings of post-humanist positions are highlighted, which do not fully grasp
human finitude. Finally, related to this finitude, the paper deploys a “methodological conservatism”,
that is, the need to recognize the dark and archaic sides of human nature. It is precisely
thanks to such uncomfortable recognition that the ideals of Enlightenment humanism can be
realistically preserved.
