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WHAT IS TRANSHUMANISM?

Human ... is that really the best we can do? Is Homo Sapiens the species to end all other? Hardly. The human body is weak and prone to disease. The human mind is feeble and unfocused. So far the story of every person that has ever existed has been a tragedy ending with the death of the main character.

We must be able to do better than that.

Religion, metaphysics and superstition has for a long time been the way humans has chosen to try and overcome their limitations. Not so any longer. At least not for the Transhumanists.

A transhumanist slogan could be "better living through technology." But it would only partly cover the Transhumanist ideals. Although Transhumanists firmly support the theory that the human condition can be bettered through technology and science, they are not blind to the perils of technology. Transhumanists are optimists, but not blind optimists.

Not only does Transhumanist want to better the human condition, they want to make us better humans. Perhaps even better than human. We should not be bounded by the limits that biology has cast upon us. We should be free to improve ourselves in any way we want to.

Already now technology is changing the human condition, and this trend will continue to accelerate for a long time. At some time we will have changed what it means to be human. We will become posthuman or "Transhuman". More than human. And hopefully better.

There are several new and upcoming technologies already underway by now. Many of them seem like pure science fiction, but they are feasible none the less. If only some of them will come through we can foresee that they will change how we look at the world.

Some of them are:

• Intelligent machines, perhaps even superintelligent. When intelligence can spontaneous arrive in biological life, why should it not could exist in other forms to? If a simulation of a human brain is precise enough wouldn't it then be more than a simulation? wouldn't it be intelligence itself?
• The hive mind and Massive global networks. We have already sensed a glimmer of how this might be. But the Internet is only a humble beginning. At some time there will be many more computers, all with varied intelligence, and they will all be able to communicate without humans involved. Massive automation will follow.
• Vastly extended life spans. Medical technology has already expanded the average life expectancy in the developed world from around 30 to around 70 years. As it is right now there seem to be a biological limit at around 110-120 years. Soon we should all be able to reach this age without our bodies withering away. Some species live considerably longer than us and there is no evidence suggesting that it is a hard physical limit to life. Maybe we can extend our life spans for hundreds or thousand of years.
• Uploading of ourselves into computer. At some point, if we live long enough, there might not be any more room in our brains to learn anything new. Then it might be a good idea to upload ourselves into a computer.
• Nanotechnology. Actually this is probably the technology that most Transhumanists pin their hope on when considering a positive and limitless future. The production of any kind of material goods by manipulating matter atom by atom is a very strong idea. It is already happening today on a very small scale in scientific laboratories around the world, and on a large scale in nature.

If the human condition is changed by technology, then of course society, culture, art and the state will change too. One of the main goals of Transhumanists is to try and make these change as positive as possible. Even though many Transhumanists have a positive outlook of the future, it is always based on a healthy scientific skepticism and rational analysis.

"Keep an open mind. But not so open as to the mind to fall out."