The theme of this article was suggested by an enigmatic remark of the French philosopher Michel Foucault on the final page of his book The Order of Things. “Man”, he writes, “is an invention of recent date. And one perhaps nearing its end.” I wish to reflect upon this suggestive remark though in somewhat different and broader terms than those of its author.

Since the time of Hegel’s use of the phrase, and particularly since Nietzsche’s sensational application of it, it has been fashionable to speak of “the death of God”—the death of God at the hand of man. However, the elimination of God which it was hoped would enable the reality of man to become more effectively visible has been superseded by a more radical consideration whose consequences profoundly affect our theory and practice today. It is the consideration that a true idea of man far from emerging into assured and concrete realization is rather breaking up and disappearing into an impersonal anonymous ground. The evidence suggests that the achievement of our age is the death of man at his own hand, at least speculatively if not yet in effect.

In this essay I propose to illustrate, and draw some conclusions from, the significance of this phenomenon by situating it in the context of its historical evolution. In what will inevitably involve rather broad generalisations and systematic simplification I will try to indicate how man today has come to be seen chiefly in socio-centric, impersonal and structural terms by contrast with two previous conceptions which can be globally described as the theo-centric and the anthropocentric conceptions of man.