By BRIAN CLOWES
(Editor’s Note: Brian Clowes has been director of research and training at Human Life International since 1995. For an electronic copy of chapter 24 of The Facts of Life, “Eugenics,” e-mail him at bclowes@hli.org.)
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“There is no time to wait for Darwinian evolution to make us more intelligent and better natured. . . . Humans are entering a new phase of what might be called self-designed evolution, in which we will be able to change and improve our DNA” — Stephen Hawking.
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The objective of transhumanism is to develop technologies that will greatly enhance the human condition by making us physically stronger, more versatile, and more intelligent. It also aims to make us more social in order to reduce conflict between individuals, groups, and even nations. Transhumanist thinkers believe that the human race will eventually self-evolve into another species entirely, and thus become post-human, or, as they call it, “Humanity+” — thus the shorthand “H+” or “h+.”
Transhumanism strives to arrive at an epochal event called the “Singularity,” that moment when human intelligence merges with technology in order to allow us to make a huge leap forward in our mental and physical abilities. No longer limited by our purely human intelligence, we will become infinite. We will become as gods. This is the ultimate expression of positive eugenics.
The mainstream media are eagerly promoting the transhumanist movement, and not only for ideological reasons. Transhumanism is full of many interesting personalities, quotes, and ideas that make for exciting articles. It also represents perhaps the ultimate form of a secular kind of hope, however vain this hope might turn out to be.
What journalist could resist quoting leading transhumanist theorist Vernor Vinge, who predicted in 1993: “Within 30 years, we will have the technological means to create super-human intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.”
Such sweeping predictions seem to have a “moving wall” deadline that is continuously moving into the future. In 2011, Time ran a lengthy article entitled “2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal.” Raymond Kurzweil performed a complex analysis and predicted that we will build an artificial, fully functioning human brain by 2025, and by 2045, the combined power of artificial intelligence will be one billion times greater than that of every human being on Earth.
At that point, the “Singularity,” or melding of human and machine, will occur, leading to the end of the human race and our evolution to the next level, whatever form it might take.
Self-directed evolution has been debated for millennia. In his Republic [380 B.C.], Plato wrote: “If we are to keep our [human] flock at the highest pitch of excellence, there should be as many unions of the best of both sexes, and as few of the inferior as possible, and . . . only the offspring of the better unions should be kept.”
Not surprisingly, the fundamental basis of transhumanism was first formulated by a eugenicist, J.B.S. Haldane. And the term “transhumanism” itself was coined by Julian Huxley, who, as we have seen, was both a committed eugenicist and a hard-core racist.
The transhumanist movement emerged from the thinking of futurists in the 1960s, and was led by a professor who called himself “FM-2030,” representing his first and middle initials followed by the year in which he would be a century old. He considered people who quickly adopted advanced concepts and technology as “transhuman,” those who were striving for the next step in evolution.
Some philosophers have labeled transhumanism one of the world’s most dangerous ideas. Others take the opposite view, claiming that technology — with a heavy emphasis on nanotech — is developing so rapidly that we will be compelled to become transhuman simply to be able to control it and avoid having it control or destroy us. Thus, transhumanism is a defense against an “X-risk,” or existential threat. This means that nanotech is intimately related to transhumanism in two fundamental ways. First, resident body-repairing nanites could theoretically halt and even reverse aging by repairing the damage done to all of the individual cells of the body. They could even repair major trauma such as amputations and gunshot wounds, greatly increasing our lifespans.
On the other hand, the tiniest programming error regarding nanotechnology could lead to apocalyptic results. Therefore, some say, a transhuman intelligence would be required if there was even the vaguest hope of avoiding such a catastrophe, called the “grey goo” scenario, or “ecophagy,” where improperly programmed nanites literally consume the environment in their mindless drive to replicate themselves.
Reinvention’s Dismal Results
Humans have a long history of attempting to reinvent our species. Despite all of our striving, it is a saga of unremitting death, suffering, and failure.
The Communists tried to build the “New Soviet Man,” a “selfless, learned, healthy, and enthusiastic” person who would immediately set to work building Karl Marx’s Utopia — and one hundred million died. Millions are still starving and dying all over the world under socialist and Communist regimes from North Korea to Venezuela.
Fascism spoke of a “New Man who is a figure of action, violence, and masculinity” who would wholeheartedly strive for the common good, free of individualism and living for the State. Meanwhile, eugenics led to the Nazi Holocaust and the pursuit of Nietzsche’s Übermensch, the Superman or “ideal Aryan man” — and 50 million more died.
Feminism promised us a “feminist paradise,” and was the only such vision to actually deliver a Utopia — to men. Now tens of millions of women live in poverty, cannot find commitment, raise their children themselves, deal with their unintended pregnancies and other problems alone and grow old alone, while men are free to run wild to their selfish heart’s content.
Now it’s the scientists’ turn. Now they are attempting to reinvent the human species by reducing people to biological machines that can be tinkered with at will, swapping parts and upgrading hormonal “software” in order to achieve the desired results.
All attempts to reinvent humanity have thus far failed — and so will transhumanism. The only question is how much death and misery will result this time.
Transhumanism’s Troubles
Deception. Whenever a new idea seems too good to be true, it is. Its promoters have an interest in concealing any facts that would make people question their assertions. Such people are attempting to make their point of view look attractive, and hope that others are too lazy or unintelligent to do the research required to unearth information that debunks their claims.
When the leaders of a movement attempt to deceive in this way, you can be certain that their intentions are evil.
The greatest weapons wielded by the Culture of Death are confusion and uncertainty. In this manner, anti-lifers hope to paralyze those who oppose them into inaction because the landscape of the debate is so obscure that the truth is effectively camouflaged.
Transhumanists use these weapons very effectively. Their greatest deception is to claim that we are already transhumanists because we are “enhancing” ourselves with artificial hearts, hips, joints, and, in some cases, entire limbs. But the crucial difference is this — such interventions are therapies intended to restore our bodies so that they can perform their original natural functions.
Transhumanism is entirely different from therapy, because it intends to augment the human body in order to make us, as the President’s Council on Bioethics described it, “better than well.”
So we must clarify in our minds the pivotal point that therapy is not “enhancement.” The Catholic Church supports the therapeutic use of implants, but has clearly condemned genetic engineering for enhancement purposes.
In 2008, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in its instruction Dignitas Personae, stated that “such manipulation would promote a eugenic mentality and would lead to indirect social stigma with regard to people who lack certain qualities,” which “would be in contrast with the fundamental truth of the equality of all human beings” and “would harm peaceful coexistence among individuals.”
Transhumanist activists claim that, within two or three decades, we will routinely meet people with prosthetics such as cybernetic limbs, eye, or ear implants, or more efficient artificial internal organs. The difference will be that the original body parts were not defective or damaged; they were voluntarily amputated and replaced with mechanical parts.
The human brain, of course, is the focus of special interest. Performance-enhancing drugs and neurological implants will greatly add to our ability to absorb, remember, process, and use vast quantities of information. One intriguing possibility is a cerebral implant which would allow us to connect directly to computer libraries so that we will have the full knowledge that the human race does, from neurosurgery to plumbing to driving stick shift vehicles perfectly on the first try.
But the transhumanists do not mention any of the problems they will inevitably encounter, such as social inequality, loss of autonomy and privacy, and above all, the loss of what makes us truly human, with all of our God-given imperfections.
The next two articles will discuss these problems.
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