The danger of transhumanism

Our library has drawn another researcher to our ranks - Stephanos Varkonis. He is investigating religious and sociological consequences of transhumanism, and working on his manuscipt "Theological Considerations of the Soul in the Age of Transhumanism", of which he showed me a first draft. At this stage it is mostly an ambitious outline, but it is already very exciting! 

And it is an extremely important thing to investigate. I need more than a couple of words to explain why I think that, so bear with me as I try to explain it below.

Technological progress throughout history has allowed us to overcome ever more limitations. Cave dwelling ancestors made clothing to overcome the limitations of our bodies to withstand cold. Monastic scholars developed glasses to correct eyesight failing with old age. Paladin-surgeons developed bionic legs to replace lost limbs during the global reclamation wars on Athra. 

Not only do we keep inventing new things to overcome our limitations, but we make the existing technology better: our "clothes" can now keep us safe in the cold of space, perception implants allow us to see things our eyes never could have seen, and cloning replaces not just our limbs but our entire bodies. 

We have changed so much that our cave dwelling ancestors may not even see us as humans, should we be transported back to their age and appear in front of them. Transhumanists embrace the vision that the human body and condition is something to be surpassed, and even transcended into a new evolutionary stage altogether, unrecognizable to the humans of the past.

But there is a grave danger in this. If we devalue the human body as a mere instrument that needs tinkering and improvement, then we implicitly rank human beings along certain dimensions: those that are stronger, faster, smarter, more beautiful versus those that are less so. This can lead to a disdain for those which have not reached the "transcended" or improved state, and therefore a condemnation of some lives as less useful and less desirable. Those are the lives most in danger from technological progress, as they will bear the burdens of the sacrifices to be made in the name of progress. When the most vulnerable among us become the victims of progress, the transhuman program has turned against humanity. 

Indeed, the very hallmark of humane thought is that it considers the vulnerable to be valuable! Consider for a moment that which is truly precious to you in your life. Is it not true that those things of true value are vulnerable? They are not to be repaired or augmented, they are cherished exactly because they are defenseless. 

Transhuman or posthuman thought must never lose sight of the value of vulnerability. The way to achieve that is by pairing the technological advances at all times with equal advances in the sphere of religion and morality. And that is why Varkonis' book is timely, necessary and important.