Images of humanity are important, and science agrees on this. It is no coincidence that the appeal to an image of humanity plays a central role in many public debates. But what is actually meant when we talk about an "image of humanity"? What are the contents of these images? What function do they have, and what role do they play? Above all: What effects do images of humanity have in everyday life? Are images of humanity truly, as some believe, the foundation of our moral and political orientations, even our most existential orientations in daily life? Questions like these have largely remained unanswered so far. Because while the term image of humanity is popular and central, it is also vague; it lacks a scientific profile. To this day, there has been no thorough theoretical investigation of the term and no attempt to explore the phenomenon of the image of humanity in general.