What Is Human? Rethinking The Boundaries Of Transhumanism

What Is Human? There are many challenges and problems facing humanity in the generations to come, but of them all, two factors will be paramount: the definition of what is human (implying the impact of the concept, and the full quiver of human rights thereof), and – secondly --the right to existence –unregulated -- of the feral human genome. We err if we are led to believe that human-generated prognosticators or computergenerated scenarios will be able to properly analyze and regulate the ultimate outcomes regarding these two supreme issues. Financial and political pressure will have their unfortunate and historically predictable effect, perhaps for the last time, as cybernetic versions of humanity will emerge from the inevitable crises and chaos that will precede the demise of the human being as we know it, and of the human body, with all its genetically embedded frailties, engineered and designed into something more predictable, durable, pleasing and tractable. We will be known as the ancestors of something that may not even resemble what we think of as ‘ human’ today: just as apes are scarcely considered primates to be cherished, though they contain up to 99% or greater of the same genetic materials that human beings call their own, similarly, those “enhanced” beings who shall come after us will neither regret the loss of, nor recognize as precious, their primeval and essential connection to ourselves as representatives of genuine humanity: we shall be their primitive and inferior ancestors. I suspect that the richness of our Pandora’s box of genetic gifts will lose its texture, flexibility and uniqueness as those inconvenient feral qualities become regulated, and, finally, extinguished in favor of prevailing fashions, political climates, social and physical efficiency, and economics, though it might be politically incorrect to even mention our extinction as anything but an unfortunate consequence of the factors causing our ultimately needing to be discarded, for genuine human beings will be as alien to them as monkeys are to us. Only if the definition of “What Is Human” is carefully defined, and the genetic manifestations guarded as the treasures that they are – that we dare not be lost to us – can we hope to retain the slightest link to something so tender and fragile as human flesh in the millennia to come. It is possible that clinging to such a past would only continue to proliferate a strain or streak of evil or destructiveness in our current species, but it might also prove to be the fighting force that keeps our life-form wanting to stay alive. It just might be that experiencing the rainbow and spectrum of the fullness of our ‘primitive’ existence supplies that essence that means life is worth living, that the range of emotions existing within us that can make us act in ways that are not human, or, shall we say, are destructive to what is around us to a greater or lesser extent, are also the roots of what grows and flowers to produce the best in us: our sense of soul, of love, of conscience, of self-value. Such would be eliminated, most likely, because of such stuff revolutions are made, and without such stuff, I’m afraid, the very will to live could be extinguished. It would take a long time for the human being to descend to that smaller, more efficient, less-feeling, more loyal robot, but the result would resemble what the social insect kingdoms have developed. What begins as a ‘crowd’ (herd) mentality devolves to a ‘hive’ mentality. Bees in beehives are all alike, tremendously efficient, and give up their lives entirely to the routines for which they were created, for the queen and hive. They

work themselves to death, living a mere 35 days. Our future is to be made less and less individual, for the sake of efficiency, predictability, long life, and economy. In contrast, the feral human genome may be the only reservoir that will be able to preserve the unpredictable – necessary to meet the stressors of a universe that is unforgivingly diverse in its challenges to self-aware existence. We should want to preserve the excitement of human BE-ing: if this essence is eliminated, we may also eliminate that quality of unique self-awareness that so often is overwhelming within our breast -- those galloping emotions, bursts of ideas, dreams of success, and the power of incandescent love. If all is known and predictable, the result may be a sameness best represented by the clone-looking figures of ‘aliens’ we now so easily can picture: big, staring eyes, big heads, expressionless mouths and faces, hairlessness, ultra-smooth skins -- lookalike creatures who walk about naked, thin, and disciplined. Efficiently the same, such ‘creatures’ represent our imagination’s nightmares— but we may be looking at ‘what is human’ two centuries from now. Will we be human then? We’ll likely be aliens, I fear—perhaps without any flesh at all with which to burden our economy, capable of ‘living’ for millennia and traveling to the stars. For greed, corruption and power drive people to lord it over others, and to create their submissive flocks of sheep. Sheep go where they are herded, and we love to be herded. It feels good: we don’t have to think. Who wants to be a black sheep, anyway? Will a spark of ‘what is human” remain within the genetically engineered creatures of the next century? It’s time to address the very definition of just what is human— what this means concerning Human Rights, and what our definition will mean as to the future of the wild human genome and the human race. Judyth Vary Baker Phoenix, AZ 2006