The Singularity Movement
and read the links in the article as well. New Age elements of course aside from
pragmatic this might not be a good idea considerations, even if conducted from
a solid Christian perspective without the get back to Eden without going through
God sort of mentality involved.
Never heard of it.
ReplyDeleteIts more often called the singularity movement, rather than cult, though it is cultic mentality of a sort, and is more commonly called Transhumanism. When I first heard of this idea, I thought it was hoopla overstating potential uses of cybernetic enhancement of humans.
DeleteRead the article, and the articles it links to, and any they link to, and google transhumanism and singularity in one search, and you will get more information.
Actually, the singularity movement is subset of the transhumanist movement (which is itself a very diffuse philosophy). From what I can gather, transhumanism posits the notion that humanity is merging with technology in a way that changes both human beings and the technology. Most (but not all) transhumanists give priority to the conscious mind (over for instance sub-conscious passions) and are optimistic that future technological advances will allow them to overcome "biological defects" which currently limit their freedom of choice.
ReplyDeleteUsing these views as a guide, many transhumanists would welcome the development of nootropics that allowed them control their moods (take that power away from instinctual biological systems), increase their I.Q.'s (which leads to better reasoning abilities and more control over choices), and increase lifespans by slowing or reversing primary aspects of the aging process (as increased time on earth gives them more time to grow and develop as human beings).
While Christians may or might not be able to agree with the main tenets of transhumanism, some aspects are appealing to Christians. For instance, most churches use modern technology to communicate with parishioners or to otherwise spread their views. In this and in other ways, Christians have implicitly and explicitly condone the virtual world--a world which almost all of us now inhabit for at least brief periods (on Facebook, playing World of Warcraft, etc.).
At the same time, many Christians, while not necessarily favoring radical life span extension, are not opposed to compressing morbidity by finding ways to slow or reverse some of the processes involved in aging. The Catholic Church provides an apt example: see the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith's "Instruction 'Dignitas Personae' on Certain Bioethical Questions" and the pope's Easter homily of a few years back.
the problems I and others see in this are essentially these. 1. that it is an escapist utopian effort to "transcend" humanness and become godlike in a practical way, merge minds even, and fix what doesn't need fixing and may eradicate some of what is right about us in the process, and create some kind of new species and new racial supremacy the transhuman vs. regularhuman, and even be used to robotize and enslave many (you could have a slave and ruler caste setup among the transhumans themselves once you have minds entrained to whatever, they can be controlled, thus curtailing free will rather than enhancing it) and 2. the bias in the main leaders and some propagandists at least is essentially the old lie of the serpent, "ye shall be as God," and standing beyond good and evil.
DeleteThanks for the information about transhumanism, but the link was singularly uninformative about singularity.
ReplyDeleteAll it said was that an unspecified percentage of readers think that this (non-existent) story is fact.
you have to scroll down the page to start the article, and it may continue on another page.
ReplyDelete