The Challenge of Transhumanism

Transhumanism is a movement that wants to reshape the human race.

It believes that we will soon have the power, through scientific and technical means, to transcend our limitations and be transformed as a species. I.e., transhumanists want there to be a new race of “posthumans.”

Transhumanism hopes to manage the transition from today’s humans to tomorrow’s posthumans. The transition will be more dramatic—vastly more dramatic—than the transition from Neanderthals to Homo sapiens.

On first encountering the aspirations of transhumanists, it’s easy to dismiss them—to laugh them off as jokes or sci-fi delusions—but transhumanists are serious.

They are so serious that many have compared the movement to a religion—one with messianic aspirations and a gospel of technological salvation and eternal life.

 

Background to Transhumanism

Around 380 B.C., Plato described his ideal society in The Republic. Among the groups of people he described in his ideal society was a class of guardians to protect and to rule the population.

For such important functionaries, one would want people of high quality, so in Book V of The Republic, Plato proposed that the guardian class be specially bred—like dogs or horses. Those thought likely to produce desirable offspring would be paired up for breeding; and those expected to produce less desirable offspring would not be given the opportunity.

The dream of selectively breeding humans did not die with Plato. It has appeared in various forms in history. In the early 20^th century, the eugenics movement proposed to improve the human race by encouraging people with positive traits to breed and discouraging or preventing those with negative traits from doing so.

At times, eugenicists urged the forcible sterilization of those with undesired characteristics—such as being poor, feeble-minded, alcoholic, mentally ill, etc.

In 1930, Pius XI condemned such measures, stating: “Public magistrates have no direct power over the bodies of their subjects; therefore, where no crime has taken place and there is no cause present for grave punishment, they can never directly harm, or tamper with the integrity of the body, either for the reasons of eugenics or for any other reason” (Castii Connubii 70).

This exhortation did not prevent the Nazi government from enacting extensive eugenic policies, leading up to an including the “final solution of the Jewish question,” which used death camps to commit genocide on a massive scale in the interests of improving racial “health.”

The Nazis gave eugenics such a bad name that support for the philosophy waned, and even those who supported it avoided using the name.

Now, however, transhumanism wants to alter the human race in ways that the eugenicists could not have dreamt.

The term transhumanism was coined in 1957 by the British biologist Julian Huxley—a eugenicist and brother of Aldous Huxley, author of the dystopian novel Brave New World (1932), which dealt with the scientific manipulation of human nature.

By the 1980s, people referring to themselves as transhumanists began to organize.

 

 

What transhumanism is

The most popular transhumanist organization is Humanity+ (pronounced “humanity plus”), and their web site offers two definitions of transhumanism:

(1) The intellectual and cultural movement that affirms the possibility and desirability of fundamentally improving the human condition through applied reason, especially by developing and making widely available technologies to eliminate aging and to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities.

(2) The study of the ramifications, promises, and potential dangers of technologies that will enable us to overcome fundamental human limitations, and the related study of the ethical matters involved in developing and using such technologies (“Transhumanist FAQ,” HumanityPlus.org).

These don’t convey the full drama of what transhumanists have in mind. Everybody wants to improve the human condition, and studying the potential ramifications, promises, and potential dangers sounds like a good thing to do. But there are flashes of drama when the definitions refer to eliminating aging and overcoming “fundamental human limitations.”

It’s when you start hearing specific examples that the gobsmacking nature of the change they’re after becomes clear.

 

What transhumanists want

The first definition says that transhumanists want to use technology to “eliminate aging and to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities.”

Of these, the key ones are the elimination of aging and greater intelligence.

Eliminating aging sounds like a very ambitious goal, but transhumanists are deadly serious. In fact, they want to do more than eliminate aging: They want to reverse it.

In the transhumanist future, people would be capable of physical immortality, lived at any biological age they wished. Not only would they not die, they would be able to stop or reverse the effects of aging so that we could have perpetual youth and health (as well as beauty).

Of course, a person might still be killed by accidents, violence, natural disasters, etc., but apart from these he would be able to go on living indefinitely—hundreds or thousands of years or more.

Accompanying the elimination of aging would be a major boost in intelligence. Transhumanists commonly speak of the development of “superintelligences” that would be as superior to ours as ours are to apes.’

With unlimited lifespan and superior intelligence, posthumans would have the time and ability to make whatever other changes they desired, leading to the enhanced physical and psychological capabilities mentioned above.

These could include greater strength, ability to survive in adverse environments (e.g., on other planets), the elimination of mental illness, and the ability to control moods, stimulate creativity, and enjoy profound and lasting joy.

In other words, transhumanists are out to create a posthuman techno-utopia.

 

How transhumanists expect to do this

Transhumanists expect to achieve these goals through a blend of science and technology.

One of the great revolutions of our times is in the biological sciences. Just a few years ago the human genome was sequenced, and now the genomes of many other species are being decoded.

Transhumanists expect that soon we will have a vastly improved understanding of how genes work, and as that understanding grows, it will become increasingly possible to manipulate our genes.

One application of this will be to cure genetic diseases, but another will be to make fundamental improvements in our genetic stock—and not just in future generations but among people who are already alive.

They propose to do what the eugenicists of the twentieth century wanted to do—and more—but without using reproduction to accomplish it. Once a certain level of scientific and technological development is reached, transhumanists foresee people making changes in their own genetic codes.

This is one way they think the goals of immortality and superior intelligence may be accomplished, but they recognize there are limits to what can be done biologically.

That’s why they don’t plan on limiting themselves to medicine. They also expect to use mechanical means. For example, they envision building computers capable of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that is superior to ours.

In fact, many transhumanists see better-than-human AI as a key tool. If we can build a machine smarter than us then that machine can work of problems too hard for us and design solutions that we either couldn’t arrive at or that would take us too long. In principle, a better-than-human AI could to improve upon itself and design an even more advanced AI.

Transhumanists also see many other technologies becoming available, including the widespread use of nanotechnology, in which machines the size of a few atoms would be able to restructure matter on the atomic level.

Robust nanotechnology would be amazing, as illustrated by proposed applications like utility fog. This would be a cloud of tiny robots that could arrange themselves into any shape needed. If you wanted a house to live in, you could program utility fog to become a house. If you wanted a car, you could program it to become a car. Or you could just have the fog carry you wherever you wanted to go.

Transhumanists foresee the merger of man and machine. Many people already have artificial replacements for body parts—knee and hip replacements, artificial hearts, etc.

Sometimes the replacement parts are better than the original. I, myself, had to have cataract surgery, which left my eyes with artificial lenses that contain built-in protection from ultraviolet light.

Transhumanists expect this trend to continue, with artificial replacements and improvements for every organ in the body.

For example, the brain might be supplemented with a neural implant allowing it to connect to computers. One of the simpler applications of this would be connecting to the Internet and communicating over it—or communicating directly with people who have similar implants, producing the electronic equivalent of telepathy.

A brain-machine interface could also allow us to supplement our memories, better analyze our experiences, and improve our intelligence. At least, that’s what transhumanists are hoping for.

They even foresee the possibility of people transcending the human form an “uploading” their minds into computer systems, where they would have digital immortality and as vastly increased mental abilities.

 

When transhumanists hope to accomplish this

Transhumanists hope to accomplish these things “in our lifetimes,” but given that they’re planning on immortality, that means an open-ended timetable.

They don’t expect these things to be achieved all at once but incrementally. For example, they don’t expect to wake up one day and hear the news that someone has invented an immortality pill. Instead, they see medicine continuing to improve slightly each year and extend the human life a little bit more.

They predict that at some point in the next few decades, the average human lifespan will be growing by more than one year per calendar year.

For example, in 2030 the average human lifespan might be 90, in 2031 it might be 91.5, and in 2032 it might be 93. As long as the rate the average lifespan is increasing is greater than one year per year, the “average” person can live indefinitely.

Transhumanists would then have all the time they need to work on their goals.

And, they argue, many may come sooner rather than later. They foresee better-than-human AI coming within a few decades, which could make all of their other goals appear much more quickly.

Some have proposed that there will be a technological “Singularity” in which technological change begins happening at a fantastically accelerated rate, making it impossible to predict what comes next.

Computer scientist Vernor Vinge has suggested that such a Singularity will occur before the 2030s (“The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human Era,” www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vinge/misc/), while entrepreneur and futurist Ray Kurzweil has predicted it before 2045 (The Singularity Is Near).

 

An influential minority

The number of people who identify as transhumanists is small. Humanity+ represents approximately six thousand people, though there are many transhumanists who do not belong to it.

Despite their numbers, transhumanists are disproportionately influential, making them a “creative minority.”

An illustration of their influence is that in 2012 Google hired Ray Kurzweil as its Director of Engineering, where he works to transform the company’s search feature by incorporating artificial intelligence and the ability to understand natural language requests for information rather than just search terms.

And aspects of the transhumanist agenda are being pursued by people who don’t identify as transhumanists. Medicine, science, and industry are all working on projects that fit in to the transhumanist agenda.

But how much of that agenda will be achieved?

 

An uncertain future

Transhumanists acknowledge that the future is uncertain—and that the technologies they propose could be dangerous.

The atomic age made us familiar with the dangers posed by nuclear weapons, but the transhumanist vision features multiple technologies with similar threat potential—including AIs that can out-think and out-compete humans, genetically engineered plagues, and runaway nanotechnology turning everything into “grey goo.”

They argue that the potential benefits outweigh the risks and urge that serious consideration be given to how to mitigate the dangers of these technologies.

 

How much will happen?

It’s virtually certain that science and medicine will continue to progress. We may expect new cures, somewhat longer lifespans, and technologies with the power to improve—and threaten—human life.

However, transhumanism assumes that key trends will continue indefinitely into the future, and this is not clear.

Even if medical science progresses to the point that it’s able to add more than a year to the average human lifespan per calendar year, there’s no guarantee that this trend will continue long term and turn into practical immortality.

Technologists are concerned that Moore’s Law—a well-established trend suggesting that computers double in power every two years—may already be breaking down. Computers will still improve in the future, but perhaps not in the exponential way they have in recent decades.

Some of the advances transhumanists want may not happen for a long time—or at all. Some experts think that better-than-human AI is unachievable.

And some transhumanists goals seem flat out impossible. The idea of “uploading” your consciousness into a computer is metaphysical nonsense. Even if there was a way to make a digital representation of all your memories and thought processes, it would still just be a digital representation—not the real you.

However, the fact some transhumanist dreams are silly does not mean the movement shouldn’t be viewed with concern.

 

The Holy See on genetic engineering

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has already expressed concern about the misuse of genetic engineering. In 2008, it warned against some of transhumanism’s aspirations:

Some have imagined the possibility of using techniques of genetic engineering to introduce alterations with the presumed aim of improving and strengthening the gene pool. Some of these proposals exhibit a certain dissatisfaction or even rejection of the value of the human being as a finite creature and person. Apart from technical difficulties and the real and potential risks involved, such manipulation would promote a eugenic mentality and would lead to indirect social stigma with regard to people who lack certain qualities, while privileging qualities that happen to be appreciated by a certain culture or society (Dignitas Personae 27).

In other words, non-therapeutic genetic engineering could lead to the creation of a genetic elite that would lord it over the unmodified.

Transhumanists argue that, in their preferred future, such modifications would be voluntary, and those who chose not to have them wouldn’t be forced to do so—thus some number of “normal” humans would still exist.

However, this does not mean that normal humans and their choices would be just as valued. Thus the CDF argues that tampering with our genetic codes this way “would end sooner or later by harming the common good, by favoring the will of some over the freedom of others” (ibid.).

This prospect is also discussed by C.S. Lewis in his book The Abolition of Man, in which he explores the consequences of manipulating human nature the way transhumanists want.

 

Playing God

Perhaps the most fundamental problem with transhumanism is that, by wanting to produce a new, posthuman species, its advocates want to play God. Discussing radical genetic engineering, the CDF writes:

[I]t must also be noted that in the attempt to create a new type of human being one can recognize an ideological element in which man tries to take the place of his Creator (ibid.).

This is exactly correct. It is one thing to improve the human condition by fighting disease and inventing new technologies, but it is another to have the creation of a new, superior species of posthumans as your explicit goal.

That goal means you want to play God, and that’s dangerous territory.

The account of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11 features a similar effort by men to ascend to heaven through their own power, and that ended with disaster.

Even if God chose not to intervene directly to thwart transhumanist plans, the attempt to play God could by itself bring on terrifying disasters, some of which we have already mentioned.

People are already describing transhumanism as a kind of secular religion, and in recent history we’ve seen a eugenically-inspired secular messianism and what it did to millions it deemed genetically inferior back in the 1940s.

Transhumanists could argue that this is an unfair comparison since their emphasis on individual rights and choices would prevent that kind of thing from happening again.

However, it is reasonable to ask whether, if they began to achieve even some of their goals, transhumanists would begin to look down on unmodified humans who refused to “get with the program.” Unmodified humans might then be viewed as second class citizens, as people to be out-competed, dominated, and replaced—the way our ancestors replaced the Neanderthals.

After all, that would be only human.

 

The Transhumanist Declaration

This declaration was developed in 1998 and adopted by the Humanity+ board in 2009.

1. Humanity stands to be profoundly affected by science and technology in the future. We envision the possibility of broadening human potential by overcoming aging, cognitive shortcomings, involuntary suffering, and our confinement to planet Earth.
2. We believe that humanity’s potential is still mostly unrealized. There are possible scenarios that lead to wonderful and exceedingly worthwhile enhanced human conditions.
3. We recognize that humanity faces serious risks, especially from the misuse of new technologies. There are possible realistic scenarios that lead to the loss of most, or even all, of what we hold valuable. Some of these scenarios are drastic, others are subtle. Although all progress is change, not all change is progress.
4. Research effort needs to be invested into understanding these prospects. We need to carefully deliberate how best to reduce risks and expedite beneficial applications. We also need forums where people can constructively discuss what should be done, and a social order where responsible decisions can be implemented.
5. Reduction of existential risks, and development of means for the preservation of life and health, the alleviation of grave suffering, and the improvement of human foresight and wisdom should be pursued as urgent priorities, and heavily funded.
6. Policy making ought to be guided by responsible and inclusive moral vision, taking seriously both opportunities and risks, respecting autonomy and individual rights, and showing solidarity with and concern for the interests and dignity of all people around the globe. We must also consider our moral responsibilities towards generations that will exist in the future.
7. We advocate the well-being of all sentience, including humans, non-human animals, and any future artificial intellects, modified life forms, or other intelligences to which technological and scientific advance may give rise.
8. We favor allowing individuals wide personal choice over how they enable their lives. This includes use of techniques that may be developed to assist memory, concentration, and mental energy; life extension therapies; reproductive choice technologies; cryonics procedures; and many other possible human modification and enhancement technologies.