Dear Diarrhea,
today I will review the manifesto of the Post-Human Movement, written by Steve Nichols and first published in 1988 in Games Monthly magazine. While it is relatively short, speaks only in general of the philosophy of posthumanism, and does a poor job of defining its terms clearly and in detail, it is, as far as I am aware at this point in time, the first published attempt at presenting something resembling a unified set of goals for the movement of post- and transhumanism.
In the first section, titled "ROBOTS," Nichols makes the argument that the social and technological advances of the 20th century have produced resources that humanity in its current state cannot fully exploit. The title suggests that robotics are the solution, but the body of the text doesn't elaborate whatsoever--whether Nichols was thinking of the cybernetic augmentation of our flesh and blood bodies, the transferal of our consciousness to a mechanical host, or the delegation of responsibilities to artificial intelligences as the solution to inadequate use of our potential, he merely alludes to it in the extremely vague sentence of "[a]t last, a software upgrade is available!"
Then, he goes on to suggest that transcending our current state of being is an inevitable evolutionary step, and that the idea has been present in philosophy for millennia in various forms; that the dissolution of the ego in Buddhism, the Egyptian Pharaohs' notion of superiority over the hoi polloi, the Übermensch of Nietzsche are all different tellings of the same story. In a sense, this is accurate, as all these advocate a higher state as the norm in the future of humanity; however, these different philosophies all have different ideas of the details of that higher state. Nichols never attempts to reconcile the Buddhist stripping of identity with the self-centered amorality of the Übermensch; and if his goal was merely to illustrate the similarity in the wish to transcend human existence, he neglects to set his own ideal for the next step.
The conclusion is just a marketing bid, therefore it is not relevant to this review; perhaps, though, the advertised leaflet, The Primal Eye explains those issues that this so-called manifesto seems to avoid.
For now, let this be enough; I will see what I can find for you next week. Maybe we'll see more of Steve Nichols' thoughts.
I leave you warming by the flame of my undying love until next time,
-Márton Körtesi.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Sunday, February 19, 2012
X-Men
Dear Diarrhea,
to start off, I would like to mention a couple pieces of pop culture that contain elements of post- or transhuman philosophy. This first post will be concerned with the incredibly prolific and widely known comic series about mutants in a contemporary world: X-Men.
It's easy to dismiss X-Men as a childish fantasy of buff men and big breasted women in tight spandex battling Evil with ridiculous superhuman powers, but while it's undeniable that there's a certain element of all that involved, the series has always had considerable depth, even from the early beginnings. We of the Y generation have largely thought of the Golden Age of comics as silly and vapid, and of the darker and grittier nineties and aughties reboots like Batman, Superman and plenty others as the true art of this genre in contrast, but perhaps there's more to some of the early stuff than one might bother to think.
Since everyone knows at least the bare minimum about the X-Men franchise, I'm not going to bother with a thorough introduction of its past and present. The long and short of it is this: in the Marvel multiverse (the collection of fictional parallel universes told of in the comics of Marvel Worldwide, Inc.), a subset of humanity has started to exhibit skills and traits that set them apart from society: telekinesis, telepathy, teleportation--a lot of stuff with the tele- prefix, basically--and society is beginning to become aware of this phenomenon, resulting in complex scenarios involving plenty of violence and politics and strong emotions.
Let us consider just the story of Professor Xavier and Magneto, to get some idea of why these comics are more potent social commentary than one might imagine. The conflict of two ideologies is at the root of their disagreement. Professor X claims that the mutants, having evolved beyond homo sapiens sapiens, should strive above all else to achieve peaceful cohabitation instead of reacting to their inevitable banishment from society with aggression in kind. Meanwhile, Magneto is the strongest advocate among mutants of darwinism, no longer really merely social, as true evolutionary boundaries have been crossed, saying that humanity is obsolete and should be exterminated or enslaved.
Of course, while one philosophy advocates ponderous inaction, and the other radical and immediate action, there's a definite power imbalance toward the darwinists: as long as they kill everyone the cohabitationists are trying to make peace with, the resulting situation will only prove them right--from the standpoint of conventional society, it's far too easy to bunch the two factions of mutants together and blame both groups for the actions of one, and from there, the logical conclusion is to eliminate mutants altogether.
Ultimately, transhumans will be defined by the common people only as evil, and by themselves according to the position they take in a single issue; the belief system of a fringe group can hijack public discourse altogether and derail social progress until they are removed from the equation. The series of X-Men is essentially an ongoing documentation of the attempts at removing that fringe group.
With that insightful wonder of a realization, I conclude today's post, my dear diarrhea.
May hugs and kisses rain on your face until my next post,
-Márton Körtesi.
to start off, I would like to mention a couple pieces of pop culture that contain elements of post- or transhuman philosophy. This first post will be concerned with the incredibly prolific and widely known comic series about mutants in a contemporary world: X-Men.
It's easy to dismiss X-Men as a childish fantasy of buff men and big breasted women in tight spandex battling Evil with ridiculous superhuman powers, but while it's undeniable that there's a certain element of all that involved, the series has always had considerable depth, even from the early beginnings. We of the Y generation have largely thought of the Golden Age of comics as silly and vapid, and of the darker and grittier nineties and aughties reboots like Batman, Superman and plenty others as the true art of this genre in contrast, but perhaps there's more to some of the early stuff than one might bother to think.
Since everyone knows at least the bare minimum about the X-Men franchise, I'm not going to bother with a thorough introduction of its past and present. The long and short of it is this: in the Marvel multiverse (the collection of fictional parallel universes told of in the comics of Marvel Worldwide, Inc.), a subset of humanity has started to exhibit skills and traits that set them apart from society: telekinesis, telepathy, teleportation--a lot of stuff with the tele- prefix, basically--and society is beginning to become aware of this phenomenon, resulting in complex scenarios involving plenty of violence and politics and strong emotions.
Let us consider just the story of Professor Xavier and Magneto, to get some idea of why these comics are more potent social commentary than one might imagine. The conflict of two ideologies is at the root of their disagreement. Professor X claims that the mutants, having evolved beyond homo sapiens sapiens, should strive above all else to achieve peaceful cohabitation instead of reacting to their inevitable banishment from society with aggression in kind. Meanwhile, Magneto is the strongest advocate among mutants of darwinism, no longer really merely social, as true evolutionary boundaries have been crossed, saying that humanity is obsolete and should be exterminated or enslaved.
Of course, while one philosophy advocates ponderous inaction, and the other radical and immediate action, there's a definite power imbalance toward the darwinists: as long as they kill everyone the cohabitationists are trying to make peace with, the resulting situation will only prove them right--from the standpoint of conventional society, it's far too easy to bunch the two factions of mutants together and blame both groups for the actions of one, and from there, the logical conclusion is to eliminate mutants altogether.
Ultimately, transhumans will be defined by the common people only as evil, and by themselves according to the position they take in a single issue; the belief system of a fringe group can hijack public discourse altogether and derail social progress until they are removed from the equation. The series of X-Men is essentially an ongoing documentation of the attempts at removing that fringe group.
With that insightful wonder of a realization, I conclude today's post, my dear diarrhea.
May hugs and kisses rain on your face until my next post,
-Márton Körtesi.
Introduction
Dear Diarrhea,
this journal was created to document my research into my BA thesis in American Studies. The general area I've picked is in the region of science fiction (speculative fiction for those anal retentives among you who cannot bear even the slightest impreciseness or political incorrectness in naming literary genres), and how the philosophies of posthumanism and transhumanism appear in that genre. Whether I can find an actual focus within that field is still to be determined, but for now, my working title is Definitions of Man: The Impact of Human Augmentation and Evolution on Society as Envisioned by Speculative Fiction Authors. My first goal is to shorten that title to merely half a page.
As I find interesting literature, be it primary or secondary, I will be posting my thoughts and comments here. Hopefully, I can do this in conjunction with the blogging class I'm taking, because the weekly requirements just might force me to do more research than I would otherwise.
I leave you, my dear diarrhea, hoping that you will be one of my more successful ventures.
Until my next post, I'm eternally yours,
-Márton Körtesi.
this journal was created to document my research into my BA thesis in American Studies. The general area I've picked is in the region of science fiction (speculative fiction for those anal retentives among you who cannot bear even the slightest impreciseness or political incorrectness in naming literary genres), and how the philosophies of posthumanism and transhumanism appear in that genre. Whether I can find an actual focus within that field is still to be determined, but for now, my working title is Definitions of Man: The Impact of Human Augmentation and Evolution on Society as Envisioned by Speculative Fiction Authors. My first goal is to shorten that title to merely half a page.
As I find interesting literature, be it primary or secondary, I will be posting my thoughts and comments here. Hopefully, I can do this in conjunction with the blogging class I'm taking, because the weekly requirements just might force me to do more research than I would otherwise.
I leave you, my dear diarrhea, hoping that you will be one of my more successful ventures.
Until my next post, I'm eternally yours,
-Márton Körtesi.
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