Heinrich Watzka

Transhumanism as a Symptom of Symbolic Misery. The Anthropological Challenge of the Digital Revolution. This essay provides a concise reappraisal of the philosophical discussion on technology of the last 30 years in the light of the technologically induced political and cultural crisis of our present time. It starts with a philosophical assessment of popular discussions on transhumanism and interprets the more backwards-oriented mindset of this movement as a symptom of the cultural decline of liberalism. After a short genealogy of this decline, it concludes with an outline of the real anthropological challenges of the digital revolution and its implications for the Christian image of man.

We have always been Cyborgs … Computers are becoming smaller and penetrating our bodies so that we can become upgraded people who can interact efficiently with their environment in smart cities and have the means to cope with aging, the world’s worst mass murderer. This development is accompanied by new challenges related to digitisation, with the emergence of the Internet Panopticon being the most serious of all. I will show that by promoting freedom as a moral, social and legal norm, we can benefit from the advantages of the digital age, while its problematic aspects do not unfold their potentially disastrous implications.

Thinking Aesthetically as an Objection to Transhumanistic Arguments. The following reflections are concerned with inconsistencies and contrary expectations. They all come down into an aesthetical thinking without the mistake of trying to define itself or the Aesthetics. The appearance of beauty will be admitted likewise to technology, art or nature. But that is not the point, what matters is the specific way of thinking and gaining knowledge. After an introduction referring to transhumanistic obscurities, the paradoxical and ambiguous essential of the problem will be vivified by selected literary texts of Stefan Zweig, Heinrich von Kleist and Christoph Martin Wieland. The justification for taking into account such literature lies in the strong and lasting impression they may cause, granting possible insight into the subtle human nature. It is straightforward the very human being in all his richness who is negotiable in the mindset of Transhumanists, isn’t it? Finally, the epistemological way of aesthetical thinking, ignored and left aside by the Transhumanists, will be reflected philosophically, and paradigmatically exemplified by two ideas: the figure of a dancer and a laugher.

Descartes’ latest vengeance. Bodiless minds in the machine of the Transhumanists. Unlike carbon-based transhumanists, silicon-based transhumanists propagate technologies such as brain-computer interfaces, whole brain emulation and mind-uploading, aiming at the creation of extended mind-world circuits (cyborgs) and substrate-independent minds. Whereas carbon-based transhumanists are deeply committed to a naturalistic anthropology, silicon-based transhumanists sympathize with strong functionalism in the philosophy mind, Neo- Lockeanism about persons, and active externalism, allowing for biologically and phenomenologically disembodied modes of existence, vastly extended cognition, and the resurgence of brain-in-the-vat scenarios. The paper focusses on some highly disputed metaphysical background assumptions of silicon-based transhumanists rather than on the technical feasibility of their visions.

Der Transhumanismus versteht sich als kulturelle Bewegung und als interdisziplinärer Forschungsansatz mit dem Ziel der umfassenden Verbesserung des Menschen, d.h. seiner kognitiven, emotionalen und moralischen Fähigkeiten, mit technischen Mitteln. Der Transhumanismus stellt lebensweltlich grundlegende Grenzziehungen in Frage, z.B. der Grenze zwischen Natur und Technik, Mensch und Tier, Mensch und Maschine, Personen und Sachen, Wachsen und Eingreifen, Therapie und enhancement. Primäres Ziel dieses Bandes ist eine Kritik des Transhumanismus. Die Beiträge diskutieren seine impliziten Metaphysik, Anthropologie und Ethik: Ist das vom Transhumanismus anvisierte Ziel metaphysisch möglich und auch technisch realisierbar? Ist die von ihm geforderte umfassende Technisierung der menschlichen Natur moralisch legitim und sozialethisch vertretbar? Ist die Selbstverbesserung des Menschen durch Überwindung seiner conditio humana überhaupt rational wünschenswert? Von der kritischen Durchleuchtung transhumanistischer Positionen soll eine aufklärerische Wirkung auf eine technikbegeisterte intellektuelle Öffentlichkeit ausgehen.

I shall distinguish between two periods of analytic ontology, one semi-idealistic, the other post-idealistic. The former fostered the very idea of a conceptual scheme within which questions of ontology could be formulated and answered in the first place; the latter rejected this idea in favour of the view that ontological inquiry neither presupposes a framework, nor provides the framework for science or everyday speech. Since then, ontology is what it always have been, the systematic study of the most fundamental categories of being, not of thought. Unfortunately, such a category theory becomes aporetic in its search for a solution of the problem of the “temporary intrinsic”. Experience cannot tell us, whether entities persist by “perduring” or by “enduring.” One can take an alternative route and seek to broaden the conceptual basis of ontology by focussing on “Being” in contrast to entities, or being. The controversy on perdurantism and endurantism emerges as a dispute over two conflicting ways of being in time, not of Being itself.