I Like My Human Limitations

            The human struggle against the fleetingness of life has been documented for centuries. From Gilgamesh to the Odyssey to the Harry Potter series, literature in particular provides a colorful history of attitudes towards mortality and the measures to which determined parties will go to ensure that their legacy, and sometimes even various manifestations of themselves, lives on. However, fiction is no longer the only place where humans have the ability to transcend their life spans.

 Who doesn't want to be immortal! Right??

 Transhumanism, the movement that combines science and technology to enable human improvement, is a reality. The topic is controversial, striking passionate responses from both pro and anti- transhumanism camps. The debate about transhumanism is subjective and revolves solely around each individual’s code of ethics. The transhumanists seem to objectively put science and progress above everything, while critics of transhumanism attempt to subjectively incorporate bigger questions of humanity into their opinions. The argument about transhumanism is a grey area, but I find many of the claims made by transhumanists to be confusing.

One such claim that is unsettling to me is made by Ronald Bailey in his article “Transhumanism: The Most Dangerous Idea?”. He states that “Human liberation from our biological constraints began when an ancestor first sharpened a stick and used it to kill an animal for food”, which I can understand and agree with. Then he elaborates by writing, “Our ancestors had no wings; now we fly. Our ancient forebears could not hear one another over 1,000 miles; now we phone.” Bailey is directly linking technology to human evolution. He is forming a relationship between a lack of certain appendages and the modern technology that supplements that absence. This is not a true comparison because we have not physically evolved into creatures with wings or with phones internally circuited to our bodies (though most people treat their phones as an extension of their being). This thought provokes the question Is evolution considered a natural process? If the answer to that question is yes, then it is impossible for the addition of technology, a man-made innovation, to be a part of evolution.

Another problem I have encountered while reading about transhumanism has to do with what I see as the homogenization effect. In Ray Kurzweil’s book The Singularity is Near, a chapter called “The Six Epochs” outlines the six steps leading to Singularity, a term used to reference the time period after the shift of transhumanism occurs, as Kurzweil sees it. In the description of his fifth epoch, titled “The Merger of Human Technology with Human Intelligence”, Kurzweil writes that, “The Singularity will allow us to overcome age-old human problems and vastly amplify human creativity.” This claim poses a conundrum. If everyone becomes more creative, does that not mean that creativity loses its value? When there becomes a surplus of something, the value of it decreases. Though this surge in creativity is meant to be a boon to transhumanism, it seems to actually be working against itself by making creativity commonplace and, ironically, uncreative. If everyone is creative, no one is creative. It frightens me because it sounds like everyone will be the same. The lack of talent of some people is what makes talent in other people so remarkable. If everyone has the same talents, like what this transhumanist writing is predicting, then there will actually be no talents because everyone is good at everything. Without flaws and mistakes, there is no variety. In my opinion, perfection is boring.

I will admit that I am nowhere near to being an expert on transhumanism. However, based upon the Bailey and Kurzweil texts I have read, it does not seem to me an appealing option though it does become a more viable one to the 21^st century human every day. Advocates of tranhumanism like Ronald Bailey claim that the combination of technological innovation with the human body is a step of evolution. They say that this fluidity between the mortal and machine will amplify human abilities and annihilate innate human flaws. These ideas are purely concerned with scientific questions and are not addressing, in my opinion, the more important ethical issues. When will there be a line drawn between what is sacred and cannot be affected? If we are to follow Bailey and Kurzweil’s example, it seems as if everything will be considered “fair game” and will be meddled with. It sounds like the basis of a post-apocalyptic horror movie to me.