Sometimes I’m reminded that many of the concepts transhumanists regularly discuss and work toward – cryonics, mind uploading, molecular nanotechnology, life extension and so on – are still extremely foreign and odd to most humans. Try telling your friends you hope to live forever through advanced technologies and see how they react. Then talk to them about the technologies that might enable you to do so.
In this article from AlterNet, a writer discusses the “Bizarre Libertarian Plan of Uploading Brains into Robots to Escape Society.” Setting aside his mistaken presumption that all transhumanists share a libertarian political persuasion (although several prominent voices do), he describes several advanced technologies and concepts central to transhumanist thought and comes to the following conclusion:
No one wants to die, but the thought of living forever among narcissistic libertarian cyborgs makes death’s cold embrace seem more like a squishy hug from the Easter Bunny.
Now AlterNet is a “liberal” blog, but I think this post would have been far more interesting had it compared the approach to transhuman concepts from both a libertarian viewpoint and a democratic transhumanist viewpoint as espoused by thinkers like Dr. James Hughes or George Dvorsky.
Politics aside, though, this article does illustrate how most people view transhumanism. First, these technologies are so radical it’s difficult for most people to wrap their minds around them As a result, transhumanist thinkers get labeled as, at best, idealists, and at worst, cranks. Second, even if you convince people that these technologies are feasible and are on their way, it’s a challenge to convince them that they’re desirable. I’m still amazed more people aren’t enthusiastic about the concept that they might never have to die a natural death.
Transhumanism’s struggle in the near future will be portraying itself in ways that aren’t scary, weird or off-putting. Even so, as transhumanist technologies advance I expect a much larger (and organized) backlash. Good, proactive PR can go a long way toward helping to mitigate negative sentiment.