1. Transhumanism

Category Archives: Transhumanism

Transcendence: The Disinformation Encyclopedia of Transhumanism and the Singularity – Video

Posted on by


Transcendence: The Disinformation Encyclopedia of Transhumanism and the Singularity
"Transcendence" (available now at http://amzn.to/152uecN) is a mind-stretching and entertaining look at the international movement that advocates the use of science and technology to overcome...

By: disinformation

See the rest here:
Transcendence: The Disinformation Encyclopedia of Transhumanism and the Singularity - Video

What it means to be a cyborg in 2019 – Quartz

Posted on by

I have a four-foot-tall robot in my house that plays with my kids. Its name is Jethro.

Both my daughters, aged 5 and 9, are so enamored with Jethro that they have each asked to marry it. For fun, my wife and I put on mock weddings. Despite the robot being mainly for entertainment, its very basic artificial intelligence can perform thousands of functions, including dance and teach karate, which my kids love.

The most important thing Jethro has taught my kids is that its totally normal to have a walking, talking machine around the house that you can hang out with whenever you want to.

Given my daughters semi-regular use of smartphones and tablets, I have to wonder how this will affect them in the future. Will they have any fear of technologies like driverless cars? Will they take it for granted that machine intelligences and avatars on computers can be their best friends, or even their bosses?

Will marrying a super-intelligent robot in 20 years be a natural decision? Even though I love technology, Im not sure how I would feel about having a robot-in-law. But my kids might think nothing of it.

This is my story of transhumanism.

Courtesy of Zoltan Istvan

My transhumanism journey began in 2003 when I was reporting a story for National Geographic in Vietnams demilitarized zone and I almost stepped on a landmine.

I remember my guide roughly shoving me aside and pointing to the metal object half sticking out of the ground in front of me.

I stared at the device that would have completely blown my legs off had my boot tripped the mine. I had just turned 30. The experience left me shaken. And it kept haunting me.

That night as I lay tense and awake in my hotel room, I had the epiphany that has helped define the rest of my life: I decided that the most important thing in my existence was to fight for survival. To put it another way: My goal was to never die.

Because I was not religious, I immediately turned to the thing that gave meaning to my world: science and technology. I took a leap of faith and made a wager that day. I later called this (and even later, dedicated a book to it) the transhumanist wager.

The life extension business of transhumanism will be a $600 billion industry by 2025.

My idea for an immortality wager came from Pascals Wager, the famous bet that caught on in the 17th century that loosely argued it was better to believe in God than not to, because you would be granted an afterlife if there was indeed a God. My transhumanist wager was based in my belief that its better to dedicate our resources to science and technology to overcome death while were still aliveso we dont ever have to find out whether there is an afterlife or not. It turns out I wasnt alone in my passion to live indefinitely through science. A small social movement, mostly of academics and researchers, were tackling similar issues, starting organizations, and funding research.

Some of them called themselves transhumanists.

Fast-forward 16 years from my landmine incident, and transhumanism has grown way beyond its main mission of just overcoming death with science.

Now the movement is the de facto philosophy (maybe even the religion) of Silicon Valley. It encapsulates numerous futurist fields: singularitarianism, cyborgism, cryonics, genetic editing, robotics, AI, biohacking, and others.

Biohacking in particular has taken offthe practice of physically hacking ones body with science, changing and augmenting our physiology the same way computer hackers would infiltrate a mainframe.

Its pretty obvious why it has emerged as such a big trend: It attracts the youth.

Not surprisingly, worrying about death is something that older people usually do (and, apparently, those younger people who almost step on landmines). Most young people feel invincible. But tell young people they can take brain drugs called nootropics that make them super smart, or give them special eye drops that let them see in the dark, or give them a chip implant that enhances human ability (like the one I have), and a lot of young people will go for it.

In 2016, I ran for the US presidency as the Transhumanist Party nominee. To get support from younger biohackers, my team and I journeyed on the Immortality Busmy 38-foot coffin-shaped campaign busto Grindfest, the major annual biohacking meet-up in Tehachapi, California. In an old dentists chair in a garage, biohackers injected me with a horse syringe containing a small radio-frequency-identification implant that uses near-field communication technologythe same wireless frequency used in most smartphones. The tiny deviceits about the size of a grain of ricewas placed just under the skin in my hand. With my chip, I could start a car, pay with bitcoin, and open my front door with a lock reader.

Four years later, I still have the implant and use it almost every day. For surfers or joggers like myself, for example, its great because I dont have to carry keys around.

One thing I do have to navigate is how some religious people view me once they understand I have one. Evangelical Christians have told me that an implant is the mark of the beast, as in from the Bibles Book of Revelations.

Even though Im tagged by conspiracy theorists as a potential contender for the Antichrist, I cant think of any negatives in my own experiences to having a chip implant. But as my work in transhumanism has reached from the US Military to the World Bank to many of the worlds most well-known universities, my chip implant only exasperates this conspiracy.

While people often want to know what other things Ive done to my body, in reality becoming a cyborg is a lot less futuristic and drastic than people think.

For me and for the thousands of people around the world who have implants, its all about functionality. An implant simply makes our lives easier and more efficient. Mine also sends out pre-written text messages when peoples phones come within a few feet of me, which is a fun party trick.

But frankly, a lot of the most transformative technology is still being developed, and if youre healthy like me, theres really not much benefit in doing a lot of biohacking today.

I take nootropics for better brain memory, but theres no conclusive research I know of that it actually works yet. Ive done some brainwave therapy, sometimes called direct neurofeedback, or biofeedback, but I didnt see any lasting changes. I fly drones for fun, and of course I also have Jethro, our family robot.

For the most part, members of the disabled community are the ones who are truly benefiting from transhumanist technologies today. If you have an arm shot off in a war, its cyborg science that gives you a robot arm controlled by your neural system that allows you to grab a beer, play the piano, or shake someones hand again.

But much more dramatic technology is soon to come. And the hope is that it will be availableand accessibleto everyone.

I asked to be added to a volunteer list for an experiment that will place implants in peoples brains that would allow us to communicate telepathically, using AI. (Biohacking trials like this are secretive because they are coming under more intense legal scrutiny.)Im also looking into getting a facial recognition security system for my home. I might even get a pet dog robot; these have become incredibly sophisticated, have fur softer than the real thing (that doesnt shed all over your couch or trigger allergies) and can even act as security systems.

Beyond that, people are using stem cells to grow new teeth, genetic editing to create designer babies, and exoskeleton technology that will likely allow a human to run on water in the near future.

Most people generally focus on one aspect of transhumanism, like just biohacking, or just AI, or just brainwave-tech devices. But I like to try it all, embrace it all, and support it all. Whatever new transhumanist direction technology takes, I try to take it all in and embrace the innovation.

This multi-faceted approach has worked well in helping me build a bridge connecting the various industries and factions of the transhumanist movement. Its what inspired me to launch presidential and California gubernatorial campaigns on a transhumanist platform. Now Im embarking on a new campaign in 2020 for US president as a Republican, hoping to get conservatives to become more open-minded about the future.

The amount of money flowing into transhumanist projects is growing into many billions of dollars. The life extension business of transhumanism will be a $600 billion industry by 2025, according to Bank of America. This is no time for transhumanism to break apart into many different divisions, and its no time to butt heads. We need to unite in our aim to truly change the human being forever.

Transhumanistsit doesnt matter what kind you arebelieve they can be more than just human. The word natural is not in our vocabulary. Theres only what transhumanists can do with the tools of science and technology they create. That is our great calling: to evolve the human being into something better than it is.

Because transhumanism has grown so broadly by now, not all transhumanists agree with me on substantially changing the human being. Some believe we should only use technology to eliminate suffering in our lives. Religious transhumanists believe we should use brain implants and virtual reality to improves our morality and religious behavior. Others tell me politics and transhumanism should never mix, and we must always keep science out of the hands of the government.

We need unity of some significant sort because as we grow at such a fast rate there are a lot of challenges ahead. For example, the conservative Christian Right wants to enact moratoriums against transhumanism. The anarcho-primativists, led by people like the primitivist philosopher and author John Zerzan (who I debated once at Stanford University), want to eliminate much technology and go back to a hunting-gathering lifestyle which they believe is more in tune with Earths original ecology. And finally, we must be careful that the so-called one percent doesnt take transhumanist technology and leave us all in the dust, by becoming gods themselves with radical tech and not sharing the benefits with humanity.

I personally believe the largest danger of the transhumanist era is the fact that within a few decades, we will have created super-intelligent AI. What if this new entity simply decides it doesnt like humans? If something is more sophisticated, powerful, intelligent, and resilient than humans, we will have a hard time stopping it if it wants to harm or eliminate us.

Whatever happens in the future, we must take greater care than we ever have before as our species enters the transhumanist age. For the first time, we are on the verge of transforming the physical structure of our bodies and our brains. And we are inventing machines that could end up being more intelligent and powerful than we are. This type of change requires that not only governments act together, but also cultures, religions, and humanity as a whole.

In the end, I believe that a lot more people will be on board with transhumanism than admit it. Nearly all of us want to eliminate disease, protect our families from death, and create a better path and purpose for science and technology.

But I also realize that this must be done ever so delicately, so as not to prematurely push our species into crisis with our unbridled arrogance. One day, we humans may look back and revel in how far our species has evolvedinto undying mammals, cyborgs, robots, and even pure living data. And the most important part will be to be able to look back and know we didnt destroy ourselves to get there.

See more here:
What it means to be a cyborg in 2019 - Quartz

Transhumanism by Julian Huxley (1957)

Posted on by

In New Bottles for New Wine, London: Chatto & Windus, 1957, pp. 13-17

As a result of a thousand million years of evolution, the universe is becoming conscious of itself, able to understand something of its past history and its possible future. This cosmic self-awareness is being realized in one tiny fragment of the universe in a few of us human beings. Perhaps it has been realized elsewhere too, through the evolution of conscious living creatures on the planets of other stars. But on this our planet, it has never happened before.

Evolution on this planet is a history of the realization of ever new possibilities by the stuff of which earth (and the rest of the universe) is made life; strength, speed and awareness the flight of birds and the social polities of bees and ants; the emergence of mind, long before man was ever dreamt of, with the production of colour, beauty, communication, maternal care, and the beginnings of intelligence and insight. And finally, during the last few ticks of the cosmic clock, something wholly new and revolutionary, human beings with their capacities for conceptual thought and language, for self-conscious awareness and purpose, for accumulating and pooling conscious experience. For do not let us forget that the human species is as radically different from any of the microscopic single-celled animals that lived a thousand million years ago as they were from a fragment of stone or metal.

The new understanding of the universe has come about through the new knowledge amassed in the last hundred yearsby psychologists, biologists, and other scientists, by archaeologists, anthropologists, and historians. It has defined mans responsibility and destinyto be an agent for the rest of the world in the job of realizing its inherent potentialities as fully as possible.

It is as if man had been suddenly appointed managing director of the biggest business of all, the business of evolution appointed without being asked if he wanted it, and without proper warning and preparation. What is more, he cant refuse the job. Whether he wants to or not, whether he is conscious of what he is doing or not, he is in point of fact determining the future direction of evolution on this earth. That is his inescapable destiny, and the sooner he realizes it and starts believing in it, the better for all concerned.

What the job really boils down to is thisthe fullest realization of mans possibilities, whether by the individual, by the community, or by the species in its processional adventure along the corridors of time. Every man-jack of us begins as a mere speck of potentiality, a spherical and microscopic egg-cell. During the nine months before birth, this automatically unfolds into a truly miraculous range of organization: after birth, in addition to continuing automatic growth and development, the individual begins to realize his mental possibilitiesby building up a personality, by developing special talents, by acquiring knowledge and skills of various kinds, by playing his part in keeping society going. This post-natal process is not an automatic or a predetermined one. It may proceed in very different ways according to circumstances and according to the individuals own efforts. The degree to which capacities are realized can be more or less complete. The end-result can be satisfactory or very much the reverse: in particular, the personality may grievously fail in attaining any real wholeness. One thing is certain, that the well-developed, well-integrated personality is the highest product of evolution, the fullest realization we know of in the universe.

The first thing that the human species has to do to prepare itself for the cosmic office to which it finds itself appointed is to explore human nature, to find out what are the possibilities open to it (including, of course, its limitations, whether inherent or imposed by the facts of external nature). We have pretty well finished the geographical exploration of the earth; we have pushed the scientific exploration of nature, both lifeless and living, to a point at which its main outlines have become clear; but the exploration of human nature and its possibilities has scarcely begun. A vast New World of uncharted possibilities awaits its Columbus.

The great men of the past have given us glimpses of what is possible in the way of personality, of intellectual understanding, of spiritual achievement, of artistic creation. But these are scarcely more than Pisgah glimpses. We need to explore and map the whole realm of human possibility, as the realm of physical geography has been explored and mapped. How to create new possibilities for ordinary living? What can be done to bring out the latent capacities of the ordinary man and woman for understanding and enjoyment; to teach people the techniques of achieving spiritual experience (after all, one can acquire the technique of dancing or tennis, so why not of mystical ecstasy or spiritual peace?); to develop native talent and intelligence in the growing child, Instead of frustrating or distorting them? Already we know that painting and thinking, music and mathematics, acting and science can come to mean something very real to quite ordinary average boys and girls provided only that the fright methods are adopted for bringing out the childrens possibilities. We are beginning to realize that even the most fortunate people are living far below capacity, and that most human beings develop not more than a small fraction of their potential mental and spiritual efficiency. The human race, in fact, is surrounded by a large area of unrealized possibilities, a challenge to the spirit of exploration.

The scientific and technical explorations have given the Common Man all over the world a notion of physical possibilities. Thanks to science, the under-privileged are coming to believe that no one need be underfed or chronically diseased, or deprived of the benefits of its technical and practical applications.

The worlds unrest is largely due to this new belief. People are determined not to put up with a subnormal standard of physical health and material living now that science has revealed the possibility of raising it. The unrest will produce some unpleasant consequences before it is dissipated; but it is in essence a beneficent unrest, a dynamic force which will not be stilled until it has laid the physiological foundations of human destiny.

Once we have explored the possibilities open to consciousness and personality, and the knowledge of them has become Common property, a new source of unrest will have emerged, will realize and believe that if proper measures are taken, no one need be starved of true satisfaction, or condemned to sub-standard fulfillment. This process too will begin by being unpleasant, and end by being beneficent. It will begin by destroying the ideas and the institutions that stand in the way of our realizing our possibilities (or even deny that the possibilities are there to be realized), and will go on by at least making a start with the actual construction of true human destiny.

Up till now human life has generally been, as Hobbes described it, nasty, brutish and short; the great majority of human beings (if they have not already died young) have been afflicted with misery in one form or anotherpoverty, disease, ill-health, over-work, cruelty, or oppression. They have attempted to lighten their misery by means of their hopes and their ideals. The trouble has been that the hopes have generally been unjustified, the ideals have generally failed to correspond with reality.

The zestful but scientific exploration of possibilities and of the techniques for realizing them will make our hopes rational, and will set our ideals within the framework of reality, by showing how much of them are indeed realizable. Already, we can justifiably hold the belief that these lands of possibility exist, and that the present limitations and miserable frustrations of our existence could be in large measure surmounted. We are already justified in the conviction that human life as we know it in history is a wretched makeshift, rooted in ignorance; and that it could be transcended by a state of existence based on the illumination of knowledge and comprehension, just as our modern control of physical nature based on science transcends the tentative fumblings of our ancestors, that were rooted in superstition and professional secrecy.

To do this, we must study the possibilities of creating a more favourable social environment, as we have already done in large measure with our physical environment. We shall start from new premises. For instance, that beauty (something to enjoy and something to be proud of) is indispensable, and therefore that ugly or depressing towns are immoral; that quality of people, not mere quantity, is what we must aim at, and therefore that a concerted policy is required to prevent the present flood of population-increase from wrecking all our hopes for a better world; that true understanding and enjoyment are ends in themselves, as well as tools for or relaxations from a job, and that therefore we must explore and make fully available the techniques of education and self-education; that the most ultimate satisfaction comes from a depth and wholeness of the inner life, and therefore that we must explore and make fully available the techniques of spiritual development; above all, that there are two complementary parts of our cosmic duty one to ourselves, to be fulfilled in the realization and enjoyment of our capacities, the other to others, to be fulfilled in service to the community and in promoting the welfare of the generations to come and the advancement of our species as a whole.

The human species can, if it wishes, transcend itself not just sporadically, an individual here in one way, an individual there in another way, but in its entirety, as humanity. We need a name for this new belief. Perhaps transhumanism will serve: man remaining man, but transcending himself, by realizing new possibilities of and for his human nature.

I believe in transhumanism: once there are enough people who can truly say that, the human species will be on the threshold of a new kind of existence, as different from ours as ours is from that of Pekin man. It will at last be consciously fulfilling its real destiny.

See more here:
Transhumanism by Julian Huxley (1957)

tech-life-game-news – Christian Post (blog)

Posted on by

Transhumanism is a movement that seeks to find the solutions to mankind problems in robotics, genetic modification and general human involvement in what would be perceived to be natural processes. This movement is often perceived as the enemy of religion because the views contrast so strongly, but that need not be the case.

To learn more about transhumanism, robotics and related concerns, visit Human Paragon, a leading resource for anyone in the Transhumanism community and anyone seeking more information. For info on how this connects to Christianity, read on.

Were All After the Same Thing

Christians and transhumanists both want to better mankind, to reduce poverty, suffering and illness the world over. These two goals are the same, and any groups that so strongly share the same ideals should not be the enemy of one another.

Transhumanists seek to better understand the genetic makeup of mankind in order to find ways of tweaking this. It is artificial evolutionand if as Christians we can accept evolution and the way that this ties into our beliefs, then surely we can so the same with the science of transhumanism. After all, it is our duty on this earth to love and to careto be altruistic. And there is nothing more loving and caring the using our natural talents and intelligence to mold the world around us in order to remove the problems we face every day.

Is It What God Would Want?

God created mankind in his image, God created a world that he deemed to be perfect, so why should we change that, right? Well you only need to look around you to see that humanity is anything but perfect and that we have near-destroyed the world He created.

If finding solutions to these problems is wrong, then how can causing these problems be right? How can it be okay to build nuclear weapons, to cause climate change, to destroy thousands of acres of natural forestry and to care the extinction of thousands of Gods creatures? None of this is right and if we continue as we are, the well only make that situation worse.

Drastic times call for drastic measures and when the world is in ruin and there seems to be little hope, the idea of transhumanism could be the answer. And if we really are created in his image then that means that everything we are came from him; everything we know and everything we have at our disposal is his. So, transhumanism could therefore not be seen as something against God, but a way of performing Gods will, a way of righting the wrongs.

Im not saying thats the case, Im just saying that there are many ways to look at this and that the ideas of groups like the transhumanists should not be so readily dismissed on religious grounds.

Learn More

As mentioned above, Human Paragon is a great place to learn more about this, and its important that you do. These techniques and ideals might actually help to bring parts of the Christian story to life. Its the only way any of us can live as long as Methuselah, the only way we can truly scale the heights that our lord set for us.

So, lets not fight it and lets at least try to understand it.

See original here:
tech-life-game-news - Christian Post (blog)

Transhumanism: Zoltan Istvan Forsees Technological Self …

Posted on by

Zoltan Istvan on The Rubin Report in October 2016.(Screengrab via YouTube)Zoltan Istvan foresees self-perfection and immortality through technology. What could possibly go wrong?

Every now and then, our electoral system produces one of those quintessentially American characters who coopt the energy of the presidential voting cycle to become national celebrities or elevate an obscure social movement into greater popular visibility. In the current cycle, New Age guru Marianne Williamson, who popularized A Course in Miracles, fits the archetype. So does entrepreneur Andrew Yang. But for my money, the transhumanist proselytizer Zoltan Istvan Gyurko (professionally known as Zoltan Istvan) is the champion at harnessing the energy generated by electoral politics to both make himself a known media personality and promote his philosophical obsessions.

For those who may still be unaware, transhumanism is a futuristic social movement that (all but) worships technology as the means of attaining the long-held human dream of immortality and the more modern yearning for radical individual bodily self-transformation. Want to have the eyesight of a hawk and the superpowers of cartoon characters, and live longer than a redwood tree? Transhumanism predicts that these dreams will come true when a crescendo of unstoppable technological advances known as the Singularity unleashes the power to transform humanity into a post-human species.

Until recently, transhumanism advocacy was limited mostly to the high academy and the speculations of futurism conferences. But then along came Istvan. With few resources beyond the financial security earned through small-scale real-estate development and his indefatigable genius for self-promotion, in 2016 Istvan propelled himself and his movement into international notoriety by touring the United States as a candidate for president on the Transhumanist Party ticket, promising to end death as he drove across the country in the immortality bus designed to look like a coffin. It was a great gimmick that worked like a charm. Istvan was interviewed countless times and featured in stories in some of the worlds most prominent media, including the New York Times and The Guardian.

In 2018 he was less successful running for governor of California on the Libertarian Party ticket. But, never one to miss a chance at elevating his prominence, in this presidential cycle Istvan is running as a Republican, challenging President Trump for the nomination under the campaign slogan Upgrading America.

As, respectively, a committed proponent and a persistent critic of transhumanism, Istvan and I have jousted publicly for years, but always without rancor. We finally spent some quality time over lunch recently when his campaign brought him to Washington, D.C., where, as part of his no publicity is bad publicity approach to advocacy and self-promotion, he agreed to an open, on-the-record interview.

Istvan first became interested in immortality in college when researching an essay on cryogenics. But his commitment to the cause became indelible in a moment of terror. In 2003, Istvan was working as a video journalist for National Geographic, covering a story about Vietnamese farmers dangerous harvest of metal from unexploded American ordnance. When he barely missed stepping on a landmine, he had a sudden epiphany. I felt like a nuclear bomb went off in my head, he recalled. Instead of covering war stories and reporting on the suffering of humanity, I had the revelation that I should eliminate suffering altogether. He quit working as a journalist, joined the nascent life-extension movement, and penned his novel, The Transhumanist Wager which he describes as a transhumanism Atlas Shrugged.

Since those early days, Istvan has become the popular face of transhumanism. He has given thousands of media and podcast interviews and boosted transhumanism in a barrage of columns, including in mainstream publications such as the New York Times, Wired, Psychology Today, the Huffington Post, and Vice. He is also an international lecturer.

Most prominent transhumanists are atheists, as was Istvan, a lapsed Catholic, when I first met him in 2014 at a transhumanism and religion conference in Berkeley. He has since adopted a soft agnosticism, embracing what is known as theistcideist theory, which he describes as the belief that a super intelligence created all that is but committed suicide to give free will to the universe. That sounds like a distinction without much of a difference to me, since it leaves humanity wholly on our own. In any event, Istvan fervently believes that our most urgent duty as a species is to save ourselves materially from the existential obliteration of death and that government must focus on both promoting and protecting that quest.

During our long conversation, I told Istvan that his views dont sound very conservative or Republican. He laughed and insisted that while he opposes born-again fundamentalism, he is fiscally very conservative. He believes in lower taxes, less regulation, tort reform, smaller government, a balanced-budget constitutional amendment, and providing tax incentives to induce people to live healthier lives. He is against the Green New Deal and its push to cut carbon emissions through government fiat, preferring the deployment of technological remedies such as geo-engineering and green energy. Moreover, he insisted, he is trying to save the transhumanist movement from what he describes as the fervent leftwingism of Silicon Valley and the socialistic views that he worries have come to permeate transhumanist advocacy generally.

But conservatism rejects utopianism. It rejects dangerous superman and eugenics theories. Believing in the equal dignity of every human being, conservatism is ultimately anti-authoritarian. Yet all these disquieting beliefs and approaches permeate transhumanist advocacy from top to bottom.

And that includes many of Istvans policy proposals. Beneath conservative planks such as requiring all immigrants to become proficient in English, the libertarian belief in open borders, and the less conservative idea that the government should provide a universal income funded by leasing federal lands, his policy views are radically transgressive and antithetical to human liberty. In this regard, I reminded him that when we first met at the religion seminar, he told the audience that war is justified against any government that thwarts transhumanism. He told me he is a bit embarrassed by putting it that starkly, but yes, he still believes that violence in the name of transhumanism is justified in certain circumstances. I am sort of an authoritarian libertarian, he laughed.

Indeed, he is. The more one digs into Istvans policy proposals, the wilder they become. He wants society to prepare for awarding civil rights for future advanced sapient beings like AI, conscious robots, cyborgs and genetically created sapient beings. He proposes a constitutional amendment to prohibit laws interfering with citizens pursuit of health and longevity, creating a right to genetic editing of progeny, cloning, and other forms of what he calls radical science. As just one example, such a right would allow parents to germline-engineer their progeny for health reasons or to fulfill their eugenic desires, creating genomic alterations that would flow down the generations.

Until very recently, he supported government licensing of parents, but hearkening to some blowback on that issue, he backed off that proposal. He would promulgate state regulatory protection over what could become a process of manufacturing humans including custom design, special order, quality and inventory control all of which are core goals of the transhumanist social revolution.

Istvan also wants to roll back privacy norms. This would include the governments making massive use of high-tech surveillance, including facial-recognition cameras, drones, robots, AI scanners, and other technology, in public places so that criminals are caught before they can carry out their harm (he adds lamely that this plan will protect gun owners while protecting those who are afraid of or dislike guns).

Never mind that such all-encompassing surveillance would enable the effectuation of an all-encompassing tyranny. China has already demonstrated the fascistic possibilities by introducing a social credit system, in which facial-recognition technologies, artificial intelligence, GPS, and other means of high-tech surveillance track individual behavior and social associations. Those branded by computer algorithms with a low social-credit score face societal excommunication, including job loss, the inability to rent an abode, even exclusion from public transportation.

That isnt all. Istvan also proposes cerebral reconditioning as an alternative to the death penalty, and, one presumes, other traditional forms of penal justice. Anyone who thinks these technologies would be a good idea has never read 1984 or Brave New World.

Why should we take any of this seriously? After all, transhumanism is hardly mainstream, and Istvan doubts his candidacy which is mostly self-funded will last much beyond Super Tuesday (although, knowing him, he will find some other way to harness the centrifugal energy of the presidential contest to boost himself and his ideas).

Heres why. Istvan is just the popularizer; behind him, some of the worlds richest and most powerful people fund transhumanism research and advocacy, including Googles Ray Kurzweil and Teslas Elon Musk. Moreover, it isnt the unlikely coming of the Singularity that makes transhumanism a perilous social force. I truly doubt we will ever upload our minds into computers to live forever in the Cloud, a core eschatological transhumanist belief. Rather, it is transhumanisms explicit utopianism and denigration of human exceptionalism that cause ones neck hair to stand on end.

Attention must be paid. The movement is growing and often receives laudatory press. For example, Time published a fawning profile of Kurzweils quest to live indefinitely under the serious title 2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal. As society secularizes and atheism grows, transhumanisms ideology of radical self-liberation is increasingly resonating. People who have lost traditional faith are looking for new sources of meaning, purpose, and hope. Indeed, committed transhumanists believe in their ageless post-human future with a fervor that borders on fundamentalist religion.

That kind of unyielding devotion, driven in part by a terror of death, has power to profoundly corrode the core liberty values of Western society. If we are going to preserve a culture founded on the Judeo-Christian ideal of equal human dignity and the concomitant obligation of individual behavioral restraint transhumanism must be rejected in our public policies, spurned intellectually, and shunned in the ways we live our individual lives. And that starts with taking the movement as seriously as do its adherents.

So, as we chuckle at Istvans eccentric campaigns, let us not lose sight of the fact that many people are being seduced by the radical values the movement fosters. And therein lies the rub. Transhumanism will never kill death. But it could be the death knell of human freedom.

Read the rest here:
Transhumanism: Zoltan Istvan Forsees Technological Self ...

Immortality or Bust – Film Threat

Posted on by

Immortality or Bust follows the 2016 presidential candidacy of Zoltan Istvan from the Transhumanist Party. If someone believes that immortality is possible and wants to run for president, their name better be Zoltan.

Transhumanism is the belief or theory that the human race can evolve behind its current physical and mental limitations with the help of science and technology. Now, whether you believe in Transhumanism or not, it does not make this documentary in less interesting. Zoltans life story sounds like a sci-fi film.

In his twenties, Zoltan Istvan traveled the world on a sailboat by himself with five hundred books aboard. In his more recent years, he had the idea to drive across the country in a coffin bus (Yes, a coffin bus) to raise awareness of Transhumanism. While doing so, he also reveals that he was running for president in 2016. At this point, just about anyone run for president, except Kanye West, he was a bit late to the party.

During the documenting of his trip and candidacy, we are given information about how technology has evolved and how it relates to human life. At one point, Zoltan talks about a heart that runs on wifi and is meant to be a life-long replacement for a human heart. We are also taken into a facility that houses frozen human bodies in hopes of waking them up/bring them back to life when science has a way of doing so and curing whatever illnesses they may have.

Zoltan talks about a heart that runs on wifi and is meant to be a life-long replacement for a human heart.

This idea of wanting to extend life is one thing, but to be immortal is something I really question. Why would anyone want that? There are far too many ethical and moral issues that come with this idea. The documentary explores these issues a bit, but not enough. It is definitely a one-sided argument and an agenda-driven documentary. With that being side, it is still quite interesting. Zoltan (along with others) gives his reasons for wanting to look further into technology to help evolve the human lifespan. Although some might have decent reasons, some are just hilarious. Zoltan often uses sex as reasoning. He talks about being able to have a heart that can withstand sexual interactions when you are older and then talks about how technology can and has made way for people to experience sexual activities while being in completely separate locations.

There is somewhat of an uneasy moment in the film. The film opens with Zoltan and his mother crying, but it is not clear why. It is not until the end of the film. It is made clear. They are crying over Zoltans fathers dead body. I get that this can push his argument further, but its also something very personal that a normal human being would probably not want on camera.

Immortality or Bust could be a documentary that is meant to sway a persons view on Transhumanism, but it is also a story of an interesting man with interesting (or far-fetched) ideas. It is surprisingly a quick watch even though it is a little more than an hour and thirteen minutes in length. Much of the documentary will also make you think of classic sci-fi movies that show how technology can change the world. Its not a good thing when Zoltan keeps mentioning Jurassic Park in his argument. We all know what happens there.

Read the original post:
Immortality or Bust - Film Threat

Beware The Transhumanists: How ‘being Human’ Is Being Re-engineered By The Elite’s Covid-19 Coup – The Nigerian Voice

Posted on by

If you tell a lie, tell a big one.If you tell a lie long enough, it becomes the truth.

Propaganda works best when those who are being manipulated are confident they are acting on their own free will.

Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Minister of Propaganda, 1933 to 1945

Transhumanism is a set of beliefs based on the premise that human beings can be improved by genetic manipulation and/or implanting technologies into the brain and body to achieve enhanced capacities. Transhumanism has a long history as an idea but since 1990 it has attracted serious attention from an increasing number of technology-lovers and early advocates are readily identified. See What is Transhumanism?

As part of his research as an investigative reporter throughout his life, which included writing a comprehensive expos of how the AIDS hoax was perpetrated in the 1980s, in 2001 Jon Rappoport interviewed a Cold War-era propagandist-turned-anonymous-whistleblower who had spent decades working for the medical and other cartels to promote their agendas to gain increasing control over the human population. Here, in part, is what the propagandist told Rappoport:

Look at the medical cartel. Do they ever declare victory? From now until the end of time theyll be planting stories in the press about the latest medical advance that will make life better for every person in the world. Most of it is a lie, but that doesnt stop them. Until the planet is depopulated down to under a billion people and every one left is a robot, these cartels [elsewhere identified as energy, government, intelligence, media,medical, military,money] are not going to quit. And even then, with a lobotomized world, theyll still push their propaganda. This IS 1984, and people better realize it... The medical cartel. Theyre planning to take over the mind... after which PR wont really matter. [pp.61-62 & 87.]

Thecartels wereusing and creatingandbolstering the Cold War as ameans toanend.Makingwhatyoucouldcall the enemygame apart of the human psycheatsuchalevel that it would maintain itself as a living myththatcouldbe tapped intoatanytimewith any enemies inserted into the lineup.The enemiesgame is as old astimeitself. But this was the version of the moment.To installa rigid sense ofnational security as the overriding fact or that would damn well justifythe deflatingof individual freedom on many fronts. Makenationalsecuritythething youcouldntrefuse. [p.70.]

A: Onceyou fatiguepeopleenough with thestrategies of 1984, they are set up forthemedicalization of society. Which is the brain stuff. The altering of the humanbrainwithdrugs andother approaches. Genes, perhaps. A brainmachinelinkup.Creating a differentperception of reality. Externally appliedelectromagnetic fields.In whichpeoplewill feel happy eventhough they are slaves.Yousee, in 1984 its really all about hysteria. The people are beingdriveninto the wall withlies aboutwars and liesabout enemies and lies about political structure, andthe control overindividuals is very harsh, and the leadersarenotlooking to create real happiness,not the fluffy stuff.Redemption,yes. Forgiveness, perhaps. The people arebeingfed pain and big brother is commandingthem like a drill sergeantthrough their TVsets. Butafter that,after people sink intoanacceptance ofthe delusions thatarebeing foisted on them, then comes the science. Themakingof somekind of replicaofhappiness.The oldorder is1984. Youcan call that thePlan fromthe dawnoftimeto about 1945. After that is the transitionto Brave NewWorld.

Q: Andthats why the medical cartel is the prince of the cartels.

A: Theprince, the king.Q:1984A: Leaves people with no moralconviction. It runsoverthatlike a freighttrain.1984is dark. Brave New World issunny andlight and the control isappliedsothatthe interiorlife changes.

Q: Soyou worked on medical stories.A:Yes. Making the medical cartellookgood, lookhumane,look rational, looklikeexcellent science that works. Especially psychiatryandneurology.Andpharmacology.That became a major job for me. Becausetheyre experimentingonthe human race, and they wanttheir horrible mistakes whicharelegion,tolooklikeadvancesand goodscienceat every stepuntil theyget it right,until theyhave your

brain in their hands fromcradle to grave. [p.71.]

As noted earlier, the words above were penned in 2001. If you would like to read the full transcript of the interview, which offers a reasonably accurate explanation of what is happening around the world at the moment, you can do so in The Matrix Revealed Volume 1, Jon Rappoport Interviews Ellis Medavoy (Part 1 of 3).

And if you would like to read about the AIDS hoax (caused by the non-existent HIV) and how it was done, using much of the same formula being used to perpetrate the elites Covid-19 hoax (caused by the non-existent SARS-CoV-2), you can do so in AIDS Inc.: Scandal of the Century.

Unfortunately, the Covid-19 hoax is being played for stakes that are infinitely higher than they were during the AIDS hoax.

After 200,000 years of Homo Sapiens, the species is about to evolve rapidly and profoundly. But it wont be a natural evolution. And it wont be an improvement unless you dont like the many qualities that make humans human, biologically and socially.

If the transhumanists have their way, individual human identity will vanish along with human volition. Homo Sapiens will be superseded by Homo Cyborg.

If this all sounds like science fiction or just plain ridiculous, let me invite you to consider the evidence below.

As warned by scientist Andrew Herr in an article see This Scientist Wants Tomorrows Troops to Be Mutant-Powered published in 2012:

Greater strength and endurance. Enhanced thinking. Better teamwork. New classes of genetic weaponry, able to subvert DNA. Not long from now, the technology could exist to routinely enhance and undermine peoples minds and bodies using a wide range of chemical, neurological, genetic and behavioral techniques.

Its warfare waged at the evolutionary level. And its coming sooner than many people think.

Well, that time has arrived. The thin edge of the wedge, if we keep allowing it to happen, is the various restrictions and technologies being introduced under cover of Covid-19 which are supposedly being used to tackle the virus.

However, just as in the AIDS epidemic when no (HIV) virus was ever scientifically demonstrated to exist, there is zero science to prove the existence of the virus labeled SARS-CoV-2. Instead, this elite coup is designed and being conducted to achieve a profound transformation in the nature of the human individual and human society, including a substantial depopulation. Moreover, it is proceeding rapidly because it entails a complexity and depth that is not easy to comprehend but also because it seems so preposterous that few people are inclined to contemplate the possibility objectively. Joseph Goebbels knew why. For some of the detail of essential elements of this coup, see Covid-19 Does Not Exist: The Global Elites Campaign of Terror Against Humanity and Halting our Descent into Tyranny: Defeating the Global Elites Covid-19 Coup.

But for another recent comprehensive history and critique of the coup being conducted by the billionaires club, see Dr. Jacob Nordangrds insightful article Analysis: Globalists reboot of the world and their plans for us which opens with the following words:

The Corona crisis is the trigger for a global coup dtat of monumental dimensions. It is the beginning of a new era, with a new international economic order that risks completely destroying human freedoms. Tyrants have now taken over to forcibly steer us into a climate smart and healthy world through the World Economic Forums new techno-totalitarian roadmap The Great Reset.

In this article, however, I want to focus on the agenda of the transhumanists under cover of this coup and what this would mean for Homo Sapiens unless it is stopped.

TechnotyrannyIn one of his videos about the Covid-19 coup watch This Couldnt Possibly Happen. Could it? the transcript for which can be accessed by clicking the Health tab after entering his website the UKs Dr Vernon Coleman explains the sinister agenda of the technological control sought by the transhumanists:

If you were a mad doctor and you wanted to control an individual it would be a doddle.

Youd just tell them you were giving them an injection to protect them against the flu or something like that and in the syringe there would be a little receiver. And then youd stick a transmitter on the roof of the house across the road from where they lived.

And then you could send messages to make them do whatever you wanted them to do. You could make them sad or angry or happy or contented. You could make them run or fight or just spend all day in bed.

Remember, thats what Dr Delgado was doing over half a century ago. Its nothing new.

Of course, if you wanted to do the same thing for lots of people youd need a whole lot of people to help you.

And youd need something to inject into people. A medicine of some kind for example.

And then youd need someone good at software to help with all the transmitting and the receiving and youd need people with access to lots of tall poles or roofs where they could put the transmitter things.

But none of that would be any good unless you had a reason for injecting people. You cant just go around injecting millions of people for no reason.

Ideally, youd need them all to be frightened of something so that they were keen to let you inject them. And then you could put your tiny receivers into the stuff that was being injected. Or squirted up their noses or whatever.

Introducing her own careful explanation of the agenda of the transhumanists, in her video Dr. Carrie Madej opens with the following words:

So what do you think about going from human 1.0 to human 2.0?... Transhumanism is about taking humans, as we know ourselves, and melding with artificial intelligence. That might seem kinda cool to you, we might have some superhuman abilities thats the idea, thats what you see in sci-fi movies Thinking about this topic... I [had thought that it was] many years in the future.

However, this question, this idea is now right in this moment. We need to make a decision... because I investigated the proposed Covid-19 vaccine and this is my alarm call to the world. I looked at the pros and cons and it frightens me.

And I want you to know about this, you need to be very well informed because this new vaccine is not like your normal flu vaccine. This is something very different, this is something brand new, something completely experimental on the human race. And its not just about being a different vaccine. There are technologies that are being introduced with this vaccine that can change the way we live, who we are and what we are. And very quickly.

Some people... like Elon Musk, who is the founder of SpaceX and Tesla Automotive, as well as Ray Kurzweil, who is one of the bigwigs of Google, are self-proclaimed transhumanists. They believe that we should go to human 2.0 and they are very big proponents of this. Theres a lot of other people... involved with this. I think the easiest way to explain this to you is to go with one of the frontrunners for the vaccine and go into a little bit of the history and tell you how they want to make the vaccine and I think that will speak volumes. So, for instance, Moderna is one of the frontrunners for the Covid-19 vaccine. Watch Human 2.0 Transhumanist Vaccine A Wake Up Call to the World.

If you doubt the capacity of medicine to achieve this level of human transformation, in this video produced in August 2020, transhumanist Elon Musk explains how his Neuralink microchip will be surgically implanted into the human brain, as has already been done with animals. While he specifically mentions the chips capacity to monitor certain health parameters and to play you music, he does not mention its intended uses for digitization of your identity, recording of your personal data such as medical and bank records, any of its surveillance functions or its capacity for emotional, thought and behavioural control. Watch This Is How Elon Musks Neuralink Microchip Will Be Put In Your Brain.

As Raul Diego explains in his own article on this subject:

The most significant scientific discovery since gravity has been hiding in plain sight for nearly a decade and its destructive potential to humanity is so enormous that the biggest war machine on the planet immediately deployed its vast resources to possess and control it, financing its research and development through agencies like the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and HHS Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA).

The revolutionary breakthrough [involved devising] a way to reprogram the molecules that carry the genetic instructions for cell development in the human body, not to mention all biological lifeforms.

These molecules are called messenger ribonucleic acid or mRNA and the newfound ability to rewrite those instructions to produce any kind of cell within a biological organism has radically changed the course of Western medicine and science, even if no one has really noticed yet. As [inventor, Professor Derek] Rossi, himself, puts it: The real important discovery here was you could now use mRNA, and if you got it into the cells, then you could get the mRNA to express any protein in the cells, and this was the big thing. See A Transhumanist Dream: A DARPA-Funded Implantable Biochip to Detect COVID-19 Could Hit Markets by 2021.

Moreover, as Patrick Wood, who has intensively studied and reported the efforts of the transhumanists for decades, explains in a recent article The Siamese Twins of Technocracy and Transhumanism and discusses in a related video Humans 2.0: GMO Vaccinations and Transhumanism that draws out some of the more nuanced elements of their agenda:

Technocracy and Transhumanism have always been joined at the hip. Technocracy uses its science of social engineering to merge technology and society. Transhumanism uses its field of NBIC to merge technology directly into humans. To put it another way, Technocracy is to society what Transhumanism is to the humans that live in it.

NBIC stands for Nano (nano-technology), Bio (bio-technology), Info (information technology) and Cogno (cognitive sciences). These four scientific disciplines remained separate avenues of study in Universities around the world until the early 1970s. Today, NBIC has become an established discipline of its own in most major universities with personnel contributed from each separate department.

All together, NBIC offers a scientific cauldron to Transhumans in their quest to create Humans 2.0.

Its also no wonder that the upcoming vaccine for COVID-19 being produced by Moderna is also using NBIC science to accomplish a merging of the human body with advanced technology. The Trump Administration has contracted with Moderna see Trump Administration collaborates with Moderna to produce 100 million doses of COVID-19 investigational vaccine to deliver 100 million doses of its investigational vaccine, ostensibly to be kitted and transported to the nation by the U.S. Military.

[Technocracy and Transhumanism are both] extremely dangerous for all of humankind and must be rejected before it is too late to stop them.

And Whitney Webb provides further insight into the elite intention in this regard. In one of her meticulously-researched articles Coronavirus Gives a Dangerous Boost to DARPAs Darkest Agenda she outlines the hidden technological agenda behind the Covid-19 coup that might well be delivered as part of any vaccination program by the Pentagons Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). After carefully outlining the history and logic of what is taking place such as the development of cyborg super soldiers and injectable Brain Machine Interfaces (BMIs) with the capability to control ones thoughts she concludes with the chilling words:

Technology developed by the Pentagons controversial research branch is getting a huge boost amid the current coronavirus crisis, with little attention going to the agencys ulterior motives for developing said technologies, their potential for weaponization or their unintended consequences.

Those who are fearful and desperate will not care that the vaccine may include nanotechnology or have the potential to genetically modify and re-program their very being, as they will only want the current crisis that has upended the world to stop.

In this context, the current coronavirus crisis appears to be the perfect storm that will allow DARPAs dystopian vision to take hold and burst forth from the darkest recesses of the Pentagon into full public view. DARPAs transhumanist vision for the military and for humanity presents an unprecedented threat, not just to human freedom, but an existential threat to human existence and the building blocks of biology itself.

Of course, if you want to read how involved corporations, DARPA and other elite agencies explain it, you can do so. But unless you dig beneath the surface you will only get their sanitized accounts which, just like Elon Musk, focus on seemingly benign elements like digitized identity and health reporting while not mentioning the technologys capacities and intended uses for the invasion of your privacy, the recording of your personal data such as medical and bank records, any of its surveillance functions or its capacity for emotional, thought and behavioural control. See, for example, Modernas mRNA Technology, Profusa is pioneering tissue-integrating biosensors for continuous monitoring of body chemistries, A Military-Funded Biosensor Could Be the Future of Pandemic Detection (which discusses the role of hydrogel) and DARPAS Developing novel, safe and efficacious treatments for COVID-19 following its much earlier In Vivo Nanoplatforms (IVN). For two elite presentations of the importance of your digital identity, see The Need for Good Digital ID is Universal and ID2020 and partners launch program to provide digital ID with vaccines.

What is at Stake?As discussed above, the technology now available after decades of effort enables receiver nanochips to be sprayed, injected or otherwise implanted into human bodies. With the ongoing deployment of 5G (which includes extensive space and ground-based technologies: see Deadly Rainbow: Will 5G Precipitate the Extinction of All Life on Earth?), just one outcome of these combined technologies is that it will be possible to direct the individual behaviour of each person so implanted. Given that the control technology will be owned by corporate executives, here is a list of examples of how the elite might direct that it be used (more or less as a drone pilot sitting in the United States controls a drone flying in the Middle East that fires weapons on local people):

1. The official chain of command to launch nuclear weapons can be subverted by using remote control to direct the chosen individual in a particular chain of command to order (or execute) the launch of one or more nuclear weapons at the target(s) nominated at the time(s) specified. Subordinates can be directed to follow orders they might otherwise question.

2. Cyborg soldiers (either as mercenaries or as members of national military forces) in groups or as individuals can be deployed anywhere to fight as ordered by those in charge of their remote controls.

3. Cyborg workers can be directed to work in dangerous conditions for extended periods and simply be replaced as required. Someone else nearby will have been vaccinated too and can be directed to take their place.

4. Cyborg consumers can be directed to purchase a particular product, irrespective of its functionality, including health or otherwise, for the person so directed. That is assuming that money is not just taken directly from their bank account, given that it will no longer be under their exclusive control.

5. Cyborg activists on any issue can simply to be directed to refrain from further involvement in their campaign. Or to actively take the opposite position to the one they had previously.

What can we do to halt this transhumanist agenda and the elite coup itself?

Fortunately, we can do a great deal.For a detailed series of options on how to have strategic impact, see the end of the article Ye are Many, They are Few: Nonviolent Resistance to the Elites Covid-19 Coup.

Importantly, however, if you would like to be part of the campaign to defeat the elite coup and prevent implementation of the transhumanist agenda, see the list of strategic goals necessary to achieve these outcomes here: Coup Strategic Aims.

If you wish to nurture children to be far more able to critique society and elite propaganda, rather than be easily duped, see My Promise to Children.

If you wish to reduce your vulnerability to elite control, consider joining those who recognize the critical importance of reduced consumption and greater self-reliance by participating in The Flame Tree Project to Save Life on Earth. In addition, you are welcome to consider signing the online pledge of The Peoples Charter to Create a Nonviolent World.

Finally, if you want a better fundamental understanding of how we reached this point, see Why Violence?, Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology: Principles and Practice and The Global Elite is Insane Revisited.

ConclusionIn the elegant words of South African liberation activist Steve Biko:

The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

When he uttered these words before being tortured to death in an Apartheid prison, Biko presumably did not realize the profound meaning they would acquire in 2020.

The transhuman mind will be owned and controlled by the oppressor.

If we are to avert this fate, we must struggle with clarity and purpose.

Biodata: Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of Why Violence? His email address is [emailprotected] and his website is here.

See the original post here:
Beware The Transhumanists: How 'being Human' Is Being Re-engineered By The Elite's Covid-19 Coup - The Nigerian Voice

"The Urgent Need for Christian Transhumanism" by Micah Redding – Video

Posted on by


"The Urgent Need for Christian Transhumanism" by Micah Redding
At the 2015 Conference of the Mormon Transhumanist Association, held 3 Apr 2015 at the Salt Lake City Public Library, speakers addressed the themes of Mormonism, Transhumanism and ...

By: Mormon Transhumanist Association

Originally posted here:
"The Urgent Need for Christian Transhumanism" by Micah Redding - Video

Transhumanisms Assumptions and their Implications …

Posted on by

The previous article in this series summarized the history of Transhumanism and outlined some of its different forms. Although in its more extreme forms it sounds like science fiction, parts of its program are already in place and there are scientists who are diligently working to make more of it a reality. It is thus important for us to think through the implications of these proposals before they are carried out and to ask not simply whether we can do them but whether we should.

Transhumanist Assumptions

Lets start with some basics of the Transhumanist worldview. Transhumanism is based on materialist metaphysics, that is, it assumes that matter and energy are all that exist. Our minds are thus a product of our brains, which are nothing more than highly complex computers. As a result, it is possible to create true Artificial Intelligence (AI) which will be able to do everything our brains do everything our brains can do. Microsoft and Elon Musk have teamed up to create advanced AI that will move in this direction. Eventually, just as our brains evolved, AI will be able to rewrite itself into more and more sophisticated forms which we might not be able to understand ourselves, leading to the Technological Singularity (the development of super-intelligence) discussed in the previous article.

To the Singularitarian and some other Transhumanists, human consciousness is the product of the brains calculations. Thus, when machines are sufficiently powerful and sophisticated, they will become conscious and self-aware themselves.

Given that there is no essential difference between our brains and computers, according to this way of thinking, we should be able to create interfaces between our brain and the super-intelligent computer network, allowing us immediate access to all the information on whatever replaces the internet. We will also have all the capabilities of super-intelligence. Since other people will be connected into this system, we will also have access to their minds, creating a collective consciousness for humanity united with the super-intelligence of the machines in technological nirvana in which we experience the fundamental unity of all things (or at least of all minds).

Technognosticism

Further, if all these assumptions are correct, a form of Immortalism naturally follows. Since the mind is a product of the brain, once the brain wears out, the mind would normally disappear, but since our brain is no different from a computer, it should be possible for us to upload it into a sufficiently complex computer and thus allow us conscious survival beyond death, perhaps in the technological nirvana. While some forms of Immortalism focus on making our bodies deathless, in this case only our consciousness would be immortal. This is thus a kind of Technognosticism, where what is ultimately important and what survives is not our bodies but our minds.

This same division of body and mind underlies Postgenderism: we can replace biological reproduction with artificial wombs and other technological fixes, fulfilling the goal of the Sexual Revolution of liberating sex from the constraints of biology and giving it its proper function of providing physical and psychological pleasure. Our gender can thus be whatever we want it to be, and we can use our technology to conform our bodies to our minds. This form of Transhumanism thus merges with the ideology of the Sexual Revolution, LGBTQ ideas, and especially Transgenderism.

Given the materialist assumptions underlying Transhumanism, this Technognostic direction seems odd, but it flows naturally from Transhumanisms initial premises. But those premises are dubious at best. While there is a connection between the brain and the mind, scientists and philosophers have been debating what it is for years. It is far from clear that the brain produces the mind, that the brain (and mind) are based on calculations of the sort that computers can do, that consciousness arises from calculations, etc. Further, creativity, empathy, compassion, individual tastes in music and art, emotions, curiosity, loveall the things that make us human and give meaning to lifecannot be reduced to computer algorithms. Yet these versions of Transhumanism assume they can.

Enhancing the Body

But what about more biologically oriented versions of Transhumanism that want to harness science and technology to take charge of our own evolution as a species, whether through life extension or technological augmentation (also known as biohacking)?

While these approaches to Transhumanism would seem to be the antithesis of Technognosticism, they do share some of the same worldview assumptions. Specifically, they tend to be materialists and to believe that science is the key to discovering truth; unlike some Singularitarians who see potential dangers in moving toward the Singularity (which should be obvious to anyone who has watched science fiction films), most biohackers assume that if we can develop an interesting technology or modification of the human body, we should try it on ourselves or on willing test subjects.

A concrete example of this is embedded RFIDchips. RFID tags have been used in a wide range of applications, including keeping track of parts or cargo, opening locks, and creating machine readable passports. RFID chips were embedded in cattle as a way of keeping track of herds and have since become common in pets. The first RFID chip was embedded in a human in 1998. They have since been used to identify VIP patrons in clubs, to pay bills, to open security doors, to monitor workflow and inventory management for patients in hospitals, and to keep medical records. The body thus functions as its own ID, as a debit card, as a key, and as a medical record systemand thus as an interface to the internet.Lest you think that this is all nothing but science fiction dreams, Elon Musk, who makes a habit of making sci-fi reality, hopes to begin human testing by the end of next year.

Similarly, scientists and engineers are working to develop artificial organs as well prosthetics that have greater abilities than natural limbs and could replace them, all of which will be connected to the internet and will have software upgrades wirelessly transmitted to them.

The Nature of Our Bodies

And here we see another assumption common to all these forms of Transhumanism: the body as an upgradeable machine. Just as uploading the mind is intimately connected to artificial intelligence and to connecting the brain to the internet (or whatever replaces it), so biohacking is designed to increase the capabilities of our bodies, giving them a technological upgrade that will enhance life. And just as the brain controls the body, so our new technologies will connect to computers, AI, and the internet to improve their functions and efficiency.

Biblically, we are embodied souls, and if we are to have a balanced worldview, we cannot neglect either. Western medicine has long viewed the body as a biochemical machine and from that perspective has developed some very effective means for repairing it. This is essentially a materialistic perspective: we are bodies and if there is a soul, it is a product of the brain. But this viewpoint does not take into account the role of the mind in health, including such things as the placebo effect or psychosomatic illnesses; it also does not explain alternative therapies such as acupuncture. In contrast, Eastern worldviews along with traditional Gnosticism say we are souls and our bodies are at best secondary to who we are.

Transhumanism either follows Transgenderism into the trap of emphasizing the mind at the expense of the body (Neo-Gnosticism or Technognosticism), or the body at the expense of the mind. While the two sides meet on the internet, in both cases you end up with a truncated vision of humanity.

Life Extension

Life extension technologies may seem harmless. After all, isnt that the goal of medicine? And much of the research is in fact benign. But when it begins moving into gene editing and splicing, manipulating mitochondrial DNA, and the like, we are entering ethically questionable territory as discussed in an earlier article.

But the questions raised by life extension technologies go well beyond these ethical issues into areas of sociology and anthropology. Suppose we succeed and vastly extend human lifespans into the hundreds or thousands of years. Suppose we actually figure out a way to make people immortal. Who would have access to the technologya question we could also ask about any other physical or intellectual augmentation? Do we create a master race that then dominates those who do not have the opportunity to benefit from the technology? Every new technology, if it survives, is adopted first by those with the money to afford it before economies of scale allow it to reach the masses; if we did develop these technologies, would they actually be shared and if so, who would pay?

And if we live forever (or close to it), what do we do about reproduction? Does it become illegal to have babies because of the problem of overpopulation? How does this change our relationships with other people? How does it change society and education? Does the evolutionary imperative to reproduce just vanish or do we need to sublimate it or provide a substitute? We already are producing robotic pets and baby dolls as companions for the elderly, not to mention sex bots, and these will only improve with AI. Does that become the future of families in a world where everyone lives for centuries or more?

The problems raised by Immortalism and other forms of technological enhancement are legion, and they all come from a defective metaphysics, the resulting defective view of humanity, and a scientism that for the most part argues that if we can do something we should. The arrogance of those who believe we can take control of our own evolution, as if we knew enough to understand all the implications of our actions, is nothing short of breathtaking.

The specter of overpopulation in the world of Immortalism is a good transition to Technogaianism, an environmental movement that looks to use technology and genetic engineering to reduce humanitys impact on the world. It fits broadly into an environmentally based worldview that we will discuss in the next article.

Continued here:
Transhumanisms Assumptions and their Implications ...

Aaron Franz – History of a Time to Come: Transhumanism and Popular Culture – Part One – Video

Posted on by


Aaron Franz - History of a Time to Come: Transhumanism and Popular Culture - Part One
In a follow-up to our previous interview Transhumanism: Man #39;s Scientific Rise to Godhood, Aaron Franz returns to discuss transhumanism and popular culture. Whether prophecy, predictive programmin ...

By: LegaliseFreedom1

See the article here:
Aaron Franz - History of a Time to Come: Transhumanism and Popular Culture - Part One - Video

Transhumanism : Memories could soon be ‘uploaded’ or ‘implanted’ into your Brain (Feb 25, 2015) – Video

Posted on by


Transhumanism : Memories could soon be #39;uploaded #39; or #39;implanted #39; into your Brain (Feb 25, 2015)
SOURCE: http://www.rt.com News Articles: Will holidays soon be uploaded to our MINDS? Dr Michio Kaku reveals how we could use our brains in the next 50 years...

By: SignsofThyComing

Go here to see the original:
Transhumanism : Memories could soon be 'uploaded' or 'implanted' into your Brain (Feb 25, 2015) - Video

Exposed: The Sorcery of "TOMORROWORLD" Georgia (R$E) Illuminati Witchcraft – Transhumanism Agenda – Video

Posted on by


Exposed: The Sorcery of "TOMORROWORLD" Georgia (R$E) Illuminati Witchcraft - Transhumanism Agenda
This is a great video covering a lot of the hidden agenda and symbolism used in this huge electronic music festivals.. There are in fact, used as energy harvesting festivals for evil purposes....

By: ThisIsWhats ReallyGoingOn

Here is the original post:
Exposed: The Sorcery of "TOMORROWORLD" Georgia (R$E) Illuminati Witchcraft - Transhumanism Agenda - Video


  1. Transhumanism