Our world today is developing scientifically at an exponential rate. Only 50 years ago life was very different, comparing that with today we can only imagine what the next 50 years technology will be like, and I don’t think we are reaching to some ”end point” in technological advancement any time soon either. This article is to speak of Transhumanism. Transhumanism is the science and method of enhancing humans with “superhuman” abilties for their benefit. It is still much in the theoretical line, but some inventions that have been done can be considered Transhuman invetnions. A transhuman is above human, a superhuman. Denoted by >H or H+. As long as Transhumanism’s applications stays to the point of treating those whose abilities have been unfortunately from birth been “below” normal human, or those who have been victims of fatal injuries in the course of their life it is fine and can bring a smile to many people, changing their lives for the better. But, there is a more dangerous side to Transhumanism, which is its unethical use by normal individuals to augment themselves with “superhuman” abilities. Obviously, if the knowledge of making such humans exists, we already might have certain governments actually creating such humans in secluded laboratories or even experimenting on soldiers themselves without the knowledge of others. So, from this view Transhumanism as a praticing science appears very “scary”. But what is the scope of Transhumanism in the near or far future? Man has continuously proved immature in handling technology. Almost immediately as a technology comes forward it finds its use in war, transhumanism by no means is an exception. And with the number of divisions among man growing, it doesn’t require a genius to figure out that if Transhumanist technologies are used in the future, our Earth may not sustain many, or even any of us eventually. However, I am quiet sure man is not going to get exitinct or even come close to it. Though if Transhumanist technology did find use in war, we would have armies of soldiers with greater abilities of destruction. At that time of course we would have a greater technology, much of it brought by the “mentally augmented” Transhumans themselves, most people would alter themselves to become these transhumans. All that would result in weapons I dare not even speak of. Of course, I hope I haven’t already scared the reader into believing that our future is nothing but oblivion! Man has developed technologically, quiet consistently but fails to evolve from his destructive mindset. Rather we have failed to understand the responsibilities we accumulate as we progress technologically, and I really don’t think the Earth can bear much of what we are doing.
Another danger of Transhumanist goals is the the madness to become immortal or extremely long lived. The question that arises is, “Why aren’t we all perfect?”. For that we need to understand what “perfect” is. If we look at Creation as a single system in which innumerous beings exist and the cycle of life and death is also a part of it, then we understand that just as we are “designed” by The Order to live we are also “designed” to perish, only to give space for more newborns. And that is the system, with perishing as a part of it is ”perfect”. Rather perfect itself is a separate view of different induvidals and an induvidual’s idea of what perfection is, is based on their present state of thinking itself. The ultimate goal lies in trying tocome to acceptance with mortality. However, if we look at ourselves as isolated induviduals working as separate from the rest of the Universe we would obviously have goals that clearly conflict with the future of other induviduals, living beings or the existence of the Earth itself ! By saying one can only imagine what a world with “extremely long lived” people would be like. Firstly, we would multiply and fill the Earth in a matter of few generations, consuming more resources and that would obviously lead to a struggle for space and resources causing more wars! As it is our Earth is quiet heavily populated. Many of the Transhumanist goals and ambitions are great for induviduals but its effect on the Earth’s eco-system or on Human societies collectively will not be given preference by all who venture to such goals.
Any Transhumanist goal comes with a former criteria – The mindset of the one indluging in the creation of Transhumans or in Transhumanist projects. To make that more clear its like, if you had the ability to create Transhumans what would you use it for? The answer to that question depends already on the inherit nature of the induvidual even before the transhuman process. To illustrate that, we can create Transhumans with a wide range of abilities, but we can also create Transhumans who are mentally more sound that ourselves. Any by “mentally sound” I don’t mean quicker in calculations or merely genius inventors of scientific inventions, but those who will be able to comprehend the “web of troubles” the Earth is into and work well into solving it, who are in a sense spiritually more advanced. Now, that makes it a boon! But that too might resound trouble in the future, because we really aren’t perfect as of now in “loading” a nature into a being, so we ultimately don’t know what we have created and what it would do in the long run. So in case, when they find us too incapable of governing and kind of baby sit us or themselves indulge in Transhuman goals, we can understand that the possibilities of a “great dangers” in future through ”small errors” earlier are quiet limitless! We the ones who created, become a sort of “sub-ordinates” then. That would make it satirical! However, whatever Transhumanism has to offer us, can be dangerous and hence any step taken of it should be with much deep thinking of not merely looking tens of years into the future, but thousands, millions or even as far as into the future as we can comprehend. That is of course only if we do care for generations so far in the future. For now, we can be more than glad to help people with physical and mental disabilities and use it towards that goal. But beyond that, we need to evaluate ourselves on whether or not we are, with our savage history, worth this knowledge. But all messages apart, the use of Transhumanism, mostly secretly by certain Earth governments seems very possible. In fact its quiet silly to believe otherwise.
Tags: Future, Posthuman, Superhuman, Technology, Transhuman, Transhumanism
