The challenges and opportunities of religious transhumanism

Although most religious people anticipate some kind of eventual salvation and victory over death, it’s not uncommon for many of them to hesitate when the prospect is actually within reach. When grand overarching redemption narratives remain in the distant future, they’re safe. They provide comfort in trials without interfering too much in our daily lives. The surprising near-term apocalyptic predictions of transhumanists, however, can be disturbing. They threaten the tidally sewn up redemption narratives, perhaps especially for some Mormons whose non-metaphysical universe is compatible enough with transhuman visions of the future to give them pause.

Many people react to these visions with both awe and disappointment, sometimes at the same time. There’s a feeling of whoa, that’s crazy and wait, is that all there is? Sort of like the red-headed man who’s at first astounded that Sherlock Holmes can divine intimate details of his personal history, but who, after having it all explained to him, says, I thought at first you had done something clever, but I see that there was nothing in it after all.

At last year’s MTA conference, our Mormon guest speaker Adam Miller shared his reservations about transhumanism with a vivid metaphor, outing himself as perhaps the most reluctant resurrectionist in all Mormondom.

Miller used the pop culture vampire as a metaphor for radical life extension. For the vampire, he says, the extension of life itself inevitably becomes something to be suffered. Every cable T V vampire worth their salt finds their existential crisis heightened rather than ameliorated by their quasi immortality.

Miller made the important point that physical renewal without a corresponding spiritual transformation, which is what presumably He assumes transhumanist salvation to be, would only serve to increase our boredom and brokenness. Like many religious people, He seems reluctant to accept transhumanist salvation as legitimate for perhaps good reasons, depending on which transhumanist one is listening to.

I’d like to address these concerns today. They arise, I believe, both from a lack of imagination on the part of many religionists who and from a lack of ethical awareness on the part of many transhumanists. This is also an area where I feel that the Mormon Transhumanist Association can provide some much needed thought leadership.

It can sometimes be alienating to be a religious transhumanist. The Apostle Paul seemed to describe Our predicament well when he said that his message was unto the Jews a stumbling block and unto the Greeks foolishness

On the one hand, many futurists, technologists, and transhumanists are strongly secular, and they see little or no benefit in the religious perspectives that we articulate. On the other hand, the ways we frame these perspectives is often viewed with suspicion by other religious people.

One of the primary goals As one of our primary goals as an organization is to try to bridge the gap between the sublime and the secular, we want to get strangers talking to each other and finding more common ground with each other.

Come to a meetup of Mormon transhumanists and you’ll find some strange combinations. Devoutly religious people rub shoulders with sceptics and atheists, and everyone seems to still be friends. Conversations tend to be enthusiastic and respectful.

Who are these people? Why do we care about bridging this gap? We feel that both sides of this divide need each other in important ways.

Ours is an age in which much technological progress seems to be carried out by secularists. According to a recent survey published in Sociology of Religion the rate of atheism and agnosticism in the academy is roughly ten times higher than in the general population of the United States.

There’s a perception that many secularists have a disdain for religious people. and a lack of respect for tradition. This perception, warranted or not, makes it a lot harder for society to successfully navigate many of the existential risks in our future. Scientists and technologists are distrusted at times when their opinions are increasingly important, and this distrust can often lead to reduced funding for scientific research.

Mormon transhumanism attempts to syncretize and valorize traditional practices while holding our minds open to new possibilities. Having been raised for the most part in traditional backgrounds, we see the value in these traditions, while we also recognize some of their limitations. We want to respect and preserve transition to the extent it remains beneficial.

We have also personally observed that many secular groups connected with transhumanism have struggled with internal contention. and disagreement that has hampered their progress. Our Mormon upbringing has given us an exceptional capacity for cooperation that helps us to overcome these fractious tendencies and get things done.

The Mormon Transhumanist Association, partly as a result of these qualities, is currently the largest advocacy network for the ethical use of technology and religion, and one of the largest transhumanist organizations.

So Mormonism lends to transhumanism these two qualities, among others. It promotes a more respectful and less disdainful attitude towards those people and groups whose cooperation will be critical towards the future success of our civilization. And it understands how to organize effectively.

In addition to these pragmatic qualities, Mormon theology is remarkably compatible with a secular worldview in ways that are often surprising to those who are less familiar with it. Mormon Scripture teaches that there is no such thing as immaterial matter, but that all spiritual phenomena must ultimately be measurable and observable in some way. Properly speaking, there is no metaphysics in Mormon cosmology. All phenomena, even those that appear to us to be miraculous, must have some natural explanation, and even God is bound by law.

Mormons also view God as a progressing being who previously lived in a state very similar to the one we’re experiencing now. These and other beliefs have the potential to make Mormonism much more coherent and palatable to secular audiences, although I believe our culture hasn’t historically attempted to reach these audiences as well as we could.

On more than one occasion, I’ve seen die-hard atheists become quite surprised and taken aback by some of these ideas.

Many secular transhumanist visions of the future fail to address important ethical challenges that religion has explored more seriously. For example, Ray Kurzweil, in his best-selling book The Singularity is Near, describes a hedonistic future in which people will be able to have sex in virtual worlds with simulations of their favorite celebrities.

Christian pastor and transhumanist Chris Bennock rescues this narrative by pointing out that any intimate relationship worth having requires both parties to be sentient. And once a being is sentient we are morally obligated to obtain its consent for all our interactions with it, and to interact with it in ways that are conducive to its well being as well as our own.

This brings up the concept of mind uploading. Some secular transhumanist visions of the future have spoken of the body as a burden and a nuisance that we will eventually discard when it becomes possible. to upload our consciousness directly into a computer.

Mormon theology, on the other hand, values embodiment highly. and claims that only when our consciousness is united with the body can we receive a fullness of joy. Indeed, artificial intelligence researchers are discovering how essential embodiment is. to all aspects of learning.

I’ve touched on some of the ways that religious transhumanism can complement and inform secular audiences, and now I’d like to spend the rest of my time addressing some concerns we often hear from religious audiences, both Mormon and non.

As I said earlier, Adam Miller raised the concern that mere immortality would be insufficient to overcome our natural brokenness and propensity to sin, and could in fact exacerbate some of the problems of our present existence I agree with him, and I feel that his calling attention to this deficiency is a good example of how secular transhumanism sometimes overlooks or downplays certain ethical challenges.

Merely living indefinitely would not satisfy us if the nature of our lives did not also adapt to our new condition. Mormonism distinguishes between immortality, overcoming death, and eternal life, which is defined as overcoming sin or achieving a state of godlike compassion and benevolence.

Mormon transhumanists believe that such eternal life is both something we should strive toward as we contemplate any physical healing or enhancement and something that we should use all tools at our disposal to try to achieve, including science and technology.

Another concern that is often expressed by religious people is the worry that we are playing God that is, that there are certain lines in the sand that are the purview of God alone. and that we are not to cross. I believe that this reflects a misunderstanding of our relationship with God.

Jesus repeatedly described our relationship with Him and God, as one of intimate communion and interconnectivity. He prayed that we might be one in Him, even as He is one with the Father. and described himself as a vine on which his disciples were the branches.

Paul taught further that we are members of the body of Christ. and that, as we serve in our several capacities, we become the means through which the salvation of Christ is administered.

In this sense, playing God is exactly what we are called to do as the servants of God. We are called to be God’s eyes, ears, hands, and feet, and to be the means through which God’s salvation is administered.

Mormonism goes further to claim that our divine destiny, our most noble aspiration, is to become like our heavenly parents, gods.

This of course doesn’t mean that it isn’t possible to pursue desired futures in detrimental ways just that the appropriateness of certain technological advances depends greatly on the context and the motivations of those involved. Whether or not playing God is a virtue or a vice depends entirely on the type of God we are playing.

Do we use our power to exalt ourselves to the exclusion of others? or to exalt our fellows and our whole community alongside ourselves? Do we strive to emulate the noblest qualities we can conceive of in our heavenly parents? or do we selfishly lord our authority over others?

Mormonism teaches that power and influence can only be maintained by persuasion, by long suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned. This is the model that Mormon transhumanists strive to emulate. In short, do we resemble Christ?

Futurists, technologists, and secularists stand to benefit greatly from the contributions of this merry band, as do the traditionally religious. I was going to call us this merry band of oddballs. Anyway, I think I’ll throw that in.

In speaking of our work, we often use the Jim Bridger analogy. When the pioneers and settlers migrated westward, they didn’t blaze their own trails instead, they followed the trails that others had blazed, like the trapper Jim Bridger. As we seek to identify and map this terrain, our hope is that this reconnaissance work may be of future benefit to our fellows both in and out of the church.

Thank you.