From the last time I wrote about this topic, there were people who did not understand my points. This is understandable, as the concept required some revisions and proper thinking. Since then, I have fleshed out the concept of cishumanism and have made it easier to understand. From some of the people who feel that the concept is “light transhumanism” can now see the distinctive differences and similarities between the two philosophies.
The concept of cishumanism can summed up in one simple term: pragmatism. With cishumanism, the intrinsic values of ideas and concepts are measured by their practicality. When deeming a concept as cishumanistic, one must ask this question: how can it be used? This casts aside most fringe topics within transhumanism due to their impracticality. Without a working prototype or substantial evidence to demonstrate the validity of a specific topic, the subject at hand has no intrinsic value and is cast aside. Concepts, like Kurtzweil’s Law of Accelerating Returns, lack empirical evidence to support their claims and are considered to be neither proven nor disproven. Because of this, they hold no validity and cannot be used to solve actual problems.
From this, one could ask if any relevant theories can be considered cishumanist. The only theories that can be considered cishumanist are the ones that have practical application. For example, suspended hibernation and warp drives are concepts that can be considered cishumanistic. These technologies have practical applications for interstellar travel, which is practical as well. AGI can be considered a cishumanist concept, but within reason. The idea of an intelligent agent that can assist with scientific or engineering issues has intrinsic value. On the other hand, an AGI with superintelligence that can assist with bestowing humanity with godlike powers is something short of fantasy. Immortalism is another topic that is excluded from cishumanism. In order to be immortal, one must outlive the universe. Because the individual will live indefinitely and the universe will exist within a definite timescale, the situation creates a philosophical loophole that doesn’t solve any existing problems.
Like transhumanism, cishumanism follows the NBIC rubric for technologies of interest. Unlike transhumanism, cishumanism only focuses on technologies that solve problems and improves current inefficiencies. For example, bioprinters can be considered both. As the cishumanist argues that bioprinters solves the problem of having less organs available to those who need them, the transhumanist agrees with this but also believes that constantly replacing aged and diseased organs could make someone immortal. The interaction between the two creates a dichotomy between the idealist and pragmatist mindsets, the philosopher and the engineer.
Here, it is made clear that cishumanism is a concept that completely eliminates the philosophical and utopian ideologies within transhumanism and replaces it with the goal of creating solutions for real-world problems. This replaces the idea of cishumanism being “light transhumanism” or “conservative transhumanism” to being the “engineer’s transhumanism” and “transhumanism made practical.” Between the utopian idealism of transhumanism and realist pragmatism of cishumanism, which side do you choose?
*hero image used from:
http://www.fastcodesign.com/1662265/almost-genius-womens-prosthetic-limbs-as-fashion-accessories
October 18, 2014 at 5:07 am
I welcome the fact that you’re looking to do transhumanism in a pragmatic sense. There are a few too many times when I see that being forgotten in discussions.
However, I take serious issue with several points in this article. Most importantly, your distinctions between pragmatic and fantasy are drawn on a whim. You demonize Kurzweil’s law of accelerating returns as unempirical when that is the ONLY thing that it is, the central tenet of the law, and makes me question whether you even looked at it before stating that. You characterize warp drive as practical, a farce when considering an evidential point of view as you assume. You strawman the immortality argument: clearly the heat death is a potential bound, but the idea is billions of years of life. If you intend this as a seminal portrayal of cishumanism, you can’t just make stuff up.
Lastly, the semantic issue of coining a new word of cishumanism seems wasteful. This is just practical transhumanism, and it seems best to pull the movement in this direction rather than create a new in-group for conflict.
October 18, 2014 at 5:45 am
It’s good to see someone offering constructive criticism on a potentially controversial topic.
First, let me point out that each point made featured the most talked about aspects of transhumanism. Yes, the central tenet of Kurtzweil’s concept is unempirical and so is much of his thesis. Making the claim that the rate of biological evolution is exponential when it is actually logistic and the misuse of Moore’s Law are two red flags among many others. There are other topics I could have mentioned, but every transhumanist knows him by name.
Warp drives could be considered practical for space travel if they are designed to be energy efficient. Currently, NASA is working on designing a working prototype that could become operational in the next 100 years. If there is some kind of breakthrough between now and then, the timescale can be shortened. That being said, it is a controversial idea so nobody is wrong when questioning it.
For the immortality argument, the point was that it is impractical and the idea alone is full of philosophical pitfalls that are nothing more than a waste of time. To be honest, any number of scenarios can keep someone from becoming truly immortal and most are situation-dependent. Heat death is one is a potential bound, but there are many more. Once again, beside the point.
As for semantics, this argument could be used against any descriptive term used within transhumanism. Singularitarianism, immortalism, technogaianism, extropianism, prometheanism, etc. are all variants that have overlap with transhumanism. By your logic, all of these terms are wasteful as they do nothing but create conflicting in-groups. Somehow, they all work together in different ways.
October 18, 2014 at 5:36 am
Dustin, can I say I told you so? I absolutely agree with Connor that coining a new phrase does not do any good. there is just no ROI for this and I think I recall that being my biggest heart burn as the law of accelerating returns is empirical. 🙂
October 18, 2014 at 5:52 am
It has people talking, doesn’t it?
October 18, 2014 at 2:17 pm
Do you feel that this is a positive thing? More talking, another piece of terminology to add to the increasing list of demarcations that everyone can sit around debating about?
October 18, 2014 at 5:27 pm
I feel that what people do with it will determine whether or not it has a positive impact. The name itself is an identifier, which inherently bears neutral connotation.
The one thing I have noticed is that people draw conclusions to the idea being “anti-transhumanist” or sexist, but that is my fault. With an idea like this, it is difficult to get the rhetoric right and it always sounds worse than it actually is.
NOTE: the term “cishumanism” references cis-trans isomerism and not cisgender. Also, cishumanism is meant to be a parallel to transhumanism and not an opposing concept.
October 18, 2014 at 6:39 pm
Identifiers are not inherently neutral. We live in the world, the words that we use relate to the world and are shaped by the way the world changes. In fact, using an identifier almost always moves things away from neutral. Even numbering things causes people to order things. You made a word up and now it means something. The thing is that it will end up meaning what other people think it means, and you managed to pick a prefix that is, at this point in time, pretty loaded.
Using cis in a chemical context would still mean ‘with or alongside’, implying that the trans usage means ‘opposite or opposing’ . And it’s not like you can just pretend that a usage for cis relating to gender just doesn’t exist. Words mean things. Meaning things is about as far from neutral as you can get.
October 18, 2014 at 6:49 pm
To be honest, I hate the fact that “cisgender” exists because it helps to make the prefix loaded. It’s true that you can’t simply ignore that it exists just because you want to. It’s there and it is used everyday. All that can be done is ensure that one has absolutely no ties to the other and people know that.
October 18, 2014 at 2:29 pm
I like the concept of cishumanism. Erudite tomes of transhumanist philosophy are interesting but I want information I can use to accomplish my goals.
October 18, 2014 at 2:35 pm
How do you define what is important and what is not? I like to use the invention of plastic when having this conversation. When people started developing this technology, if you would have asked them what it would be used for, they would not have said “Just about everything”. You can’t decide how important of a type of research for future technologies will be based on the standards we currently use in the present. It goes against historical precedents of major breakthroughs. Furthermore, while you separate the developments into “practical” and “impractical”, you still completely sidestep the crucial issue which is that these developments (both types) are developed out of 100 tiny projects and breakthroughs, each one having merit in it’s own right. By ignoring the process of research required for these things to occur, you ignore the base concept of how things develop: through hard work on small things. Maybe immortality is impractical, but you honestly believe that the person studying the pathways utilized to mitigate apoptosis pathways won’t be bringing anything to the table in terms of long term hibernation for space travel? I mean, hey, at least they are _doing_ something.
re: your response to semantics – You mean they all co exist together in different ways. Work implies action. Having a variety of philosophical beliefs co exist is not really that large of an achievement.