Transhumanist politics

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from
Democratic transhumanism
)

Transhumanist politics constitutes a group of political ideologies that generally express the belief in improving human individuals through science and technology. Specific topics include space migration, and cryogenic suspension.[1] It is considered the opposing ideal to the concept of bioconservatism, as Transhumanist politics argue for the use of all technology to enhance human individuals.[2][3]

History

The term "transhumanism" with its present meaning was popularised by Julian Huxley's 1957 essay of that name.[4]

Natasha Vita-More was elected as a Councilperson for the 28th Senatorial District of Los Angeles in 1992. She ran with the Green Party, but on a personal platform of "transhumanism". She quit after a year, saying her party was "too neurotically geared toward environmentalism".[5][6]

libertarian and anarcho-capitalist transhumanism.[8] He claims that the left was pushed out of the World Transhumanist Association Board of Directors, and that libertarians and Singularitarians have secured a hegemony in the transhumanism community with help from Peter Thiel, but Hughes remains optimistic about a techno-progressive future.[8]

In 2012, the Longevity Party, a movement described as "100% transhumanist" by cofounder Maria Konovalenko,[9] began to organize in Russia for building a balloted political party.[10] Another Russian programme, the 2045 Initiative was founded in 2012 by billionaire Dmitry Itskov with its own proposed "Evolution 2045" political party advocating life extension and android avatars.[11][12]

In October 2013, the political party Alianza Futurista ALFA was founded in Spain with transhumanist goals and ideals inscribed in its statutes.[13]

In October 2014, Zoltan Istvan announced that he would be running in the 2016 United States presidential election under the banner of the "Transhumanist Party."[14] By November 2019, the Party claimed 880 members, with Gennady Stolyarov II as chair.[15]

Other groups using the name "Transhumanist Party" exist in the United Kingdom[16][17][18] and Germany.[19]

Core values

According to a 2006 study by the European Parliament, transhumanism is the political expression of the ideology that technology and science should be used to enhance human abilities and characteristics like physical beauty, or lifespan.[1][20]

According to Amon Twyman of the

techno-libertarianism, and anarcho-transhumanism. Twyman considers such philosophies to collectively constitute political transhumanism.[21]

libertarian transhumanist Ronald Bailey is critical of the democratic transhumanism described by James Hughes.[25][26] Jeffrey Bishop wrote that the disagreements among transhumanists regarding individual and community rights is "precisely the tension that philosophical liberalism historically tried to negotiate," but that disagreeing entirely with a posthuman future is a disagreement with the right to choose what humanity will become.[27] Woody Evans has supported placing posthuman rights in a continuum with animal rights and human rights.[28]

Riccardo Campa wrote that transhumanism can be coupled with many different political, philosophical, and religious views, and that this diversity can be an asset so long as transhumanists do not give priority to existing affiliations over membership with organized transhumanism.[29]

Criticism

Truman Chen of the Stanford Political Journal considers many transhumanist ideals to be anti-political.[30]

Anarcho-transhumanism

Flag of anarcho-transhumanism, represented by a blue and black diagonal flag, where the blue is representative of futuristic symbolism[31]

Anarcho-transhumanism is a philosophy synthesizing anarchism with transhumanism that is concerned with both social and physical freedom respectively.[32] Anarcho-transhumanists define freedom as the expansion of one's own ability to experience the world around them.[33] Anarcho-transhumanists may advocate various praxis to advance their ideals, including computer hacking, three-dimensional printing, or biohacking.[34][32]

The philosophy draws heavily from the

cisheteropatriarchy[37] and primitivism.[43] Much of early anarcho-transhumanist thought was a response to anarcho-primitivism. Anarcho-transhumanism may be interpreted either as criticism of, or an extension of humanism, because it challenges what being human means.[32]

Anarcho-transhumanists also criticise non-anarchist forms of transhumanism such as

libertarian transhumanism as incoherent and unsurvivable due to their preservation of the state. They view such instruments of power as inherently unethical and incompatible with the acceleration of social and material freedom for all individuals.[44] Anarcho-transhumanism is generally anti-capitalist, arguing capitalist accumulation of wealth would lead to dystopia while partnered with transhumanism, instead advocating for equal access to advanced technologies that enable morphological freedom and space travel.[45][46]

Anarcho-transhumanist philosopher William Gillis has advocated for a 'social singularity', or a transformation in humanity's morals, to complement the technological singularity. This social singularity will ensure that no coercion will be required to maintain order in a future society where people are likely to have access to lethal forms of technology.[47]

Democratic transhumanism

Democratic transhumanism, a term coined by

transhumanists (advocates for the development and use of human enhancement technologies) who espouse liberal, social, and/or radical democratic political views.[48][49][50][51]

Philosophy

According to Hughes, the ideology "stems from the assertion that human beings will generally be

rational control of the natural and social forces that control their lives."[49][52]
The
personhood theory.[53] Democratic transhumanists support equal access to human enhancement technologies in order to promote social equality and to prevent technologies from furthering the divide among the socioeconomic classes.[54]
While raising objections both to

An attempt to expand the middle ground between

According to Hughes, the terms techno-progressivism and democratic transhumanism both refer to the same set of Enlightenment values and principles; however, the term technoprogressive has replaced the use of the word democratic transhumanism.[56][57]

Trends

Hughes has identified 15 "left futurist" or "left techno-utopian" trends and projects that could be incorporated into democratic transhumanism:

List of democratic transhumanists

These are notable individuals who have identified themselves, or have been identified by Hughes, as advocates of democratic transhumanism:[58]

Criticism

Science journalist

libertarian transhumanism.[25][26]

Critical theorist

Libertarian transhumanism

Libertarian transhumanism is a

Self-identified libertarian transhumanists, such as Ronald Bailey of Reason magazine and Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit, are advocates of the asserted "right to human enhancement" who argue that the free market is the best guarantor of this right, claiming that it produces greater prosperity and personal freedom than other economic systems.[61][62]

Principles

Libertarian transhumanists believe that the principle of

biolibertarianism".[61]

As strong

democratic transhumanists, because they fear that any state intervention will steer or limit their choices.[26][64]

Extropianism, the earliest current of transhumanist thought defined in 1988 by philosopher Max More, initially included an anarcho-capitalist interpretation of the concept of "spontaneous order" in its principles, which states that a free market economy achieves a more efficient allocation of societal resources than any planned or mixed economy could achieve. In 2000, while revising the principles of Extropy, More seemed to be abandoning libertarianism in favor of modern liberalism and anticipatory democracy. However, many Extropians remained libertarian transhumanists.[48]

Criticisms

Critiques of the

techno-utopianism of libertarian transhumanists from progressive cultural critics include Richard Barbrook and Andy Cameron's 1995 essay The Californian Ideology; Mark Dery's 1996 book Escape Velocity: Cyberculture at the End of the Century; and Paulina Borsook
's 2000 book Cyberselfish: A Critical Romp Through the Terribly Libertarian Culture of High-Tech.

Barbrook argues that libertarian transhumanists are proponents of the

cyberculture who want to escape from their "meat puppet" through mind uploading into cyberspace.[67] Borsook asserts that libertarian transhumanists indulge in a subculture of selfishness, elitism, and escapism.[68]

Sociologist James Hughes is the most militant critic of libertarian transhumanism. While articulating "democratic transhumanism" as a sociopolitical program in his 2004 book Citizen Cyborg,[51] Hughes sought to convince libertarian transhumanists to embrace social democracy by arguing that:

  1. catastrophic threats
    from transhumanist technologies;
  2. Only believable and effective public policies to prevent adverse consequences from new technologies will reassure skittish publics that they do not have to be banned;
  3. Social policies must explicitly address public concerns that transhumanist biotechnologies will exacerbate social inequality;
  4. Monopolistic practices and overly restrictive intellectual property law can seriously delay the development of transhumanist technologies, and restrict their access;
  5. Only a strong
    liberal democratic state can ensure that posthumans are not persecuted
    ; and
  6. Libertarian transhumanists (who are anti-naturalists) are inconsistent in arguing for the free market on the grounds that it is a natural phenomenon.

Klaus-Gerd Giesen, a German political scientist specializing in the

reduce everything to the hereditary gene, as a fantasy of omnipotence to be found within the individual, even if it means transforming the subject (human) to a new draft (posthuman).[69]

Marxist Transhumanism

Marxist Transhumanism or Left Transhumanism is a

Marxist Transhumanists believe that the class struggle central to Marxist approach to society and economics must be central in a Transhumanist context. Arguing that with

Bryan Johnson's costly medical treatments and Jeff Bezos's Altos Labs as proof that the capitalist class is slowly gaining the ability to obtain longevity treatments while the rest of working class people die at a rate of 100,000 per day.[71]

Basis

Marxist Transhumanists hold that a new society must come about either through revolution or reforms for the masses of people to truly experience the opportunities of a Transhumanist society. Despite the abundance that may occur if a society has vastly automated labor. The social relations which dictate society will not allow that abundance to be distributed in a egalitarian manner under capitalism. Marxist Transhumanist often point to food production and hunger as well as the producible results of fast fashion and the 1 billion people without shoes as foreshadowing of the conditions which will encompass longevity treatments or an abundance of resources.[72][73][74] In addition Marxist Transhumanist assert Transhumanism should return to its roots in regards to economics holding that a return to a transhumanism akin to Russian Cosmism or Individuals such as Alexander Bogdanov, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, or Ivan Yefremov. Another fundamental concept within Marxist Transhumanism is the texts and literature of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and Vladimir Lenin. In which proto-transhumanist ideas can be found as well as the numerous philosophical connections between Marxism and transhumanism. Marxist transhumanism would comply with the definition of communism of Marx and Engels, and it could even be said that Marxism is, essentially, transhumanist in its foundations, even when it defines posthumans as New Men, or Men Made In Property.[70]

Criticisms

Jeffrey Noonan argues that a Marxist transhumanism is politically and ethically incoherent. While it is true that Transhumanists and Marxists believe that human beings are self-determining and self-transforming. Transhumanists are committed to transcending the material conditions of organic life with their ultimate aim being to encourage the emergence of an artificial superintelligence whose self-creative capacities are not limited by the needs of organic life forms. Socialism, by contrast, is a political and ethical movement committed to ending the suffering caused by capitalism, by changing social institutions and the values according to which resources are distributed and utilized.[75]

See also

References

  1. ^
    PMID 16943331
    .
  2. .
  3. ^ "Ageless Bodies, Happy Souls". The New Atlantis. Retrieved 2023-05-28.
  4. ^ Huxley, Julian (1957). "Transhumanism". Archived from the original on June 25, 2016. Retrieved February 24, 2006. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  5. ^ Rothman, Peter (8 October 2014). "Transhumanism Gets Political". hplusmagazine.com. Retrieved 7 July 2015.
  6. ^ Hughes, James. "The Politics of Transhumanism". changesurfer.com. Retrieved 18 August 2016. Ironically, Natasha Vita-More was actually elected to Los Angeles public office on the Green Party ticket in 1992. However her platform was "transhumanism" and she quit after one year of her two year term because the Greens were "too far left and too neurotically geared toward environmentalism."
  7. ^ Hughes, James (10 April 2009). "Transhumanist politics, 1700 to the near future". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  8. ^ a b c Hughes, James (1 May 2013). "The Politics of Transhumanism and the Techno-Millennial Imagination, 1626–2030" (PDF). Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Archived from the original on 2015-06-01. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  9. ^ Konovalenko, Maria (26 July 2012). "Russians organize the "Longevity Party"". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Archived from the original on 24 November 2016. Retrieved 14 January 2015. On July 19, we made the first step towards the creation of the Longevity Party. [...] Longevity Party is 100% transhumanist party.
  10. ^ Pellissier, Hank (20 August 2012). "Who are the "Longevity Party" Co-Leaders, and What do They Want? (Part 1)". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 14 January 2015. The recently-formed Longevity Party was co-founded by Ilia Stambler of Israel and Maria Konovalenko of Russia.
  11. ^ Dolak, Kevin (27 August 2012). "Technology Human Immortality in 33 Years Claims Dmitry Itskov's 2045 Initiative". Retrieved 22 August 2015.
  12. ^ Eördögh, Fruzsina (7 May 2013). "Russian Billionaire Dmitry Itskov Plans on Becoming Immortal by 2045". Archived from the original on 24 May 2015. Retrieved 22 August 2015.
  13. ^ Sánchez, Cristina (3 June 2015). "Transhumanismo en política: ¿votarías por ser un cíborg que vive eternamente?". elDiario.es.
  14. ^ Bartlett, Jamie (23 December 2014). "Meet the Transhumanist Party: 'Want to live forever? Vote for me'". The Telegraph. Zoltan decided to form the Transhumanist Party, and run for president in the 2016 US presidential election.
  15. ^ Bromwich, Jonah (19 May 2018). "Death of a Biohacker". The New York Times. Retrieved 3 June 2018. Gennady Stolyarov II, the chairman of the United States Transhumanist Party, a political organization with close to 880 members that supports life extension through science and technology, had been corresponding with Mr. Traywick since November 2015.
  16. ^ Volpicelli, Gian (14 January 2015). "Transhumanists Are Writing Their Own Manifesto for the UK General Election". Motherboard. Vice. As the UK's 2015 general election approaches, you've probably already made up your mind on who knows best about the economy, who you agree with on foreign policy, and who cuts a more leader-like figure. But did you ever wonder who will deliver immortality sooner? If so, there's good news for you, since that's exactly what the UK Transhumanist Party was created for.
  17. ^ Volpicelli, Gian (27 March 2015). "A Transhumanist Plans to Run for Office in the UK". Motherboard. Vice. Twyman intends to stand as an independent MP for the constituency of Kingston, on the radically pro-technology platform of the Transhumanist Party UK (TPUK), of which he's cofounder and leader.
  18. ^ Solon, Olivia (10 April 2015). "Cyborg supporting Transhumanist Party appoints first political candidate in UK". Mirror. The newly-launched Transhumanist Party, which supports people who want to become cyborgs, has appointed its first political candidate in the UK.
  19. ^ Benedikter, Roland (4 April 2015). "The Age of Transhumanist Politics – Part II". The Leftist Review. Archived from the original on 2018-01-01. Retrieved 2015-07-31. The Transhumanist Party is gaining traction also in other parts of the Western world – mainly in Europe so far. Among them are the Tranhumanist Party of the UK, the Transhumanist Party of Germany (Transhumanistische Partei Deutschland) and others, all currently in the process of foundation.
  20. ^ European Parliament (2006). "Technology Assessment on Converging Technologies" (PDF). ii. Retrieved 12 January 2015. On the one side are the true believers in the potential of technology to make individuals ever more perfect. Transhumanism is a political expression of that. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  21. ^ Twyman, Amon (7 October 2014). "Transhumanism and Politics". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Archived from the original on 8 September 2016. Retrieved 11 January 2015. I would suggest that the way forward is to view transhumanism as a kind of political vector, axis, or hub rather than a single party or philosophy. In other words, the different political philosophies supportive of transhumanism (e.g. Social Futurism, Techno-Progressivism, Anarcho-Transhumanism, Techno-Libertarianism etc) should be considered to collectively constitute Political Transhumanism.
  22. ^ Dvorsky, George (31 March 2012). "J. Hughes on democratic transhumanism, personhood, and AI". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 13 January 2015. The term 'democratic transhumanism' distinguishes a biopolitical stance that combines socially liberal or libertarian views (advocating internationalist, secular, free speech, and individual freedom values), with economically egalitarian views (pro-regulation, pro-redistribution, pro-social welfare values), with an openness to the transhuman benefits that science and technology can provide, such as longer lives and expanded abilities. [...] In the last six or seven years the phrase has been supplanted by the descriptor 'technoprogressive' which is used to describe the same basic set of Enlightenment values and policy proposals: Human enhancement technologies, especially anti-aging therapies, should be a priority of publicly financed basic research, be well regulated for safety, and be included in programs of universal health care
  23. ^ Hughes, James; Roux, Marc (24 June 2009). "On Democratic Transhumanism". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 13 January 2015. When I wrote Citizen Cyborg in 2004 we had just begun defining the ideological position that embraced both traditional social democratic values as well as future transhuman possibilities, and we called it 'democratic transhumanism.' Since then, the people in that space have adopted the much more elegant term 'technoprogressive.'
  24. ISSN 1932-1066. Archived from the original
    on 14 January 2015. Retrieved 13 January 2015. Democratic transhumanism calls for an equal access to technological enhancements, which could otherwise be limited to certain socio-political classes and related to economic power, consequently encoding racial and sexual politics.
  25. ^ a b Bailey, Ronald (2005). "Trans-Human Expressway: Why libertarians will win the future". Retrieved 5 February 2006. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  26. ^ a b c Bailey, Ronald (2009). "Transhumanism and the Limits of Democracy". Retrieved 1 May 2009. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  27. PMID 21088098
    . Retrieved September 22, 2015. The tension between the individual and the political that we see within trans-humanist philosophies is precisely the tension that philosophical liberalism historically tried to negotiate." and "[T]o question the posthuman future is to question our liberty to become what we will.
  28. . Retrieved August 16, 2016. Consider the state of posthumanism as a domain (*PR*). The careful definition of this domain will be vital in articulating the nature of the relationship between humanity and posthumanity. It will be an asymmetrical relationship, at first heavily favoring humans. It will become, if the posthuman population (and/or their power or influence) grows, a domain in which posthumans may favor themselves at the expense of humans, as humans favor themselves at the expense of animals and machinery within their own domains and networks.
  29. ^ Campa, Riccardo, "Toward a transhumanist politics", Re-public, archived from the original on June 14, 2012, The central transhumanist idea of self-directed evolution can be coupled with different political, philosophical and religious opinions. Accordingly, we have observed individuals and groups joining the movement from very different persuasions. On one hand such diversity may be an asset in terms of ideas and stimuli, but on the other hand it may involve a practical paralysis, especially when members give priority to their existing affiliations over their belonging to organized transhumanism.{{citation}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  30. ^ Chen, Truman (15 December 2014). "The Political Vacuity of Transhumanism". Stanford Political Journal. Even some transhumanists have criticized the emergence of the Transhumanist Party, questioning the utility of politicizing transhumanist goals. In reality, the ideals the Transhumanist Party embodies are anti-political.
  31. ^ "An Anarcho-Transhumanist FAQ (Why the color blue?)". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  32. ^ .
  33. ^ Gillis, William (6 January 2012). "What Is Anarcho-Transhumanism?". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  34. .
  35. ^ "An Anarcho-Transhumanist FAQ (What's all this about anarchism and transhumanism?)". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  36. ^ Munkittrick, Kyle. "On the Importance of Being a Cyborg Feminist". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  37. ^ a b c Gillis, William (21 September 2011). "The Floating Metal Sphere Trump Card". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  38. ^ Brix, Terra (4 April 2018). "This Machine Kills Ability". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  39. ^ a b Linnell, Lexi (November 2016). "This Machine Kills Ableism". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  40. ^ Carrico, Dale (5 March 2006). "Technology Is Making Queers Of Us All". Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  41. ^ Gillis, William (18 August 2015). Science As Radicalism. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  42. ^ Saitta, Eleanor (2009). "Designing the Future of Sex" (PDF). Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  43. ^ Gillis, William (13 June 2006). 15 Post-Primitivist Theses. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  44. ^ Gillis, William (29 October 2015). The Incoherence And Unsurvivability Of Non-Anarchist Transhumanism (Speech). Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  45. ^ Bookchin, Murray (May 1965). Towards a Liberatory Technology. Anarchos. Retrieved 1 August 2020.
  46. ^ Carson, Kevin (February 8, 2019). "Ephemeralization for Post-Capitalist Space Exploration" (PDF). Anarcho-Transhuman (4): 23–29.
  47. ^ "What is Anarcho-Transhumanism?". The Anarchist Library. Retrieved 2022-12-21.
  48. ^ a b c Hughes, James (2001). "Politics of Transhumanism". Retrieved 2007-01-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  49. ^ a b c d Hughes, James (2002). "Democratic Transhumanism 2.0". Retrieved 2007-01-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  50. ^ Hughes, James (2003). "Better Health through Democratic Transhumanism". Archived from the original on 2006-10-11. Retrieved 2007-01-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  51. ^ .
  52. ^ James Hughes (20 July 2005). "On Democratic Transhumanism". The Journal of Geoethical Nanotechnology. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  53. ^ Hughes, James (1996). "Embracing Change with All Four Arms: A Post-Humanist Defense of Genetic Engineering". Retrieved 2007-01-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  54. ISSN 1932-1066. Archived from the original
    on 14 January 2015. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  55. ^ Carrico, Dale (2005). "Listen, Transhumanist!". Retrieved 2007-01-27. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  56. ^ George Dvorsky (31 March 2012). "J. Hughes on democratic transhumanism, personhood, and AI". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  57. ^ James Hughes and Marc Roux (24 June 2009). "On Democratic Transhumanism". Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. Retrieved 13 January 2015.
  58. ^ "Cyborg Democracy". Archived from the original on 2016-09-08. Retrieved 2018-01-15.
  59. ^ Carrico, Dale (2005). "Bailey on the CybDemite Menace". Retrieved 2006-02-05. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  60. ^ Carrico, Dale (2009). "James Hughes Flogs for the Robot Cult". Retrieved 2010-03-27. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  61. ^ .
  62. .
  63. .
  64. ^ Bailey, Ronald (2005). "Trans-Human Expressway: Why libertarians will win the future". Retrieved 2006-02-05. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  65. ^ Barbrook, Richard; Cameron, Andy (2000). "The Californian Ideology". Archived from the original on 2006-11-09. Retrieved 2007-02-06. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  66. ^ Barbrook, Richard (2007). "Cyber-Communism: How the Americans Are Superseding Capitalism in Cyberspace". Retrieved 2009-05-21. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  67. .
  68. .
  69. ^ Giesen, Klaus-Gerd (2004). "Transhumanisme et génétique humaine". Archived from the original on 2007-03-10. Retrieved 2006-04-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  70. ^
    ISSN 1715-6718
    .
  71. ^ Perdue, Mitzi (2014-01-29). "Aubrey de Grey: Out to Defy Death". GEN - Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News. Retrieved 2023-08-10.
  72. S2CID 85672210
    .
  73. ^ "Humanitarian organisations estimate one person dying of hunger every four seconds - World | ReliefWeb". reliefweb.int. 2022-09-20. Retrieved 2023-08-10.
  74. ^ "Solely Because of the Increasing Disorder: The Thirty-Sixth Newsletter (2021)". Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research. Retrieved 2023-08-10.
  75. ISSN 1715-6718
    .

External links