The Pros And Cons Of Transhumanism

Transhumanism is a philosophy based on the technologies of genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics (GNR), and artificial intelligence that argues for the transcendence of human limitations by harnessing the power of science and technology to an advantage. Transhumanism is also used to denote a philosophical field that examines the possibilities and ethics of such dramatic technological change as represented by GNR and artificial intelligence. With the idea of transhumanism is today’s world, there is a very obvious conflict. There are always two sides to an argument and you could definitely say that both sides of transhumanism both state some very good points. I’d say my stance in this whole argument is somewhere in between both sides because

The pro-transhumanist would likely argue that “the goal toward which humanity has been striving for millennia has been to liberate ourselves from more and more of our ancestors’ biological constraints” (Bailey, 2004, p. 452). Bailey has a very good point here because as a species, humans have progressed naturally since mankind was even a thing and even today we face various biological constraints that slow us down. If we could use the ideals of transhumanism to solve and fix these constraints than we will, in theory, be near-perfect human beings. All throughout human life on earth, we have gotten better over time as a species. To give a few examples, “our ancestors had no wings; now we fly. Our ancient forebears could not hear one another over 1,000 miles; now we phone. And our Stone Age progenitors averaged 25 years of life; now we live 75” (Bailey, 2004, p. 452). A big reason for all of this? Technology advancements throughout time. If the human species has been advancing through technology in all of these years, then why is it such a big conflict now? There are so many variables that come into play with this idea, one side will never be completely

The idea of modifying the human body and brain is a very touchy subject. This idea can be very scary, and even more importantly, highly unpredictable. By modifying a human, we would be “modifying a complex, inter-linked package of traits, and we will never be able to anticipate the ultimate outcome” (Fukuyama, 2003, p. 449). Fukuyama also has a very good point here. I agree that by modifying one trait or part of a human, there is no way to predict what would happen to that person’s other traits. For example, if we modify someone’s ability to be “violent and aggressive, we wouldn’t be able to defend ourselves; if we didn’t have feelings of exclusivity, we wouldn’t be loyal to those close to us; if we never felt jealousy, we would also never feel love” (Fukuyama, 2003, p.449). We have to be careful about what we would modify about a human being. As the quote stated, for every trait that we think is hurting us, there is a trait that comes from it, that benefits us immensely. Another example would be that the equality of people in the world would be damaged and ruined. If some of the humans of the word started to get modified into superior beings, where would the people that can’t afford these modifications fall in? As a whole, humans of the world preach and build communities on equality. When