Cengage Learning

Posthumanism: The Future of Homo Sapiens, 1st Edition

  • Michael Bess Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN
  • Diana Walsh Pasulka University of North Carolina Wilmington
  • Published By:
  • ISBN-10: 0028664485
  • ISBN-13: 9780028664484
  • DDC: 12823
  • Grade Level Range: 12th Grade - College Senior
  • 480 Pages | eBook
  • Original Copyright 2018 | Published/Released January 2018
  • This publication's content originally published in print form: 2018

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About

Overview

Posthumanism: The Future of Homo Sapiens will provide an introduction to a vast array of scholarly perspectives on emergent technologies and biotechnologies used to modify or augment the capabilities of human beings. The handbook covers the fundamental aspects of how bioenhancement will become feasible, what shape these technologies are likely to take, and what sorts of concrete consequences they will have for people’s lives. This volume strives for both intellectual clarity and a genuinely accessible voice, always emphasizing the practical and moral implications of bioenhancement technologies. Posthumanism takes an interdisciplinary approach to the subject, integrating science and technology as well as the arts, humanities, religious perspectives, and ethics.

Features and Benefits

  • Introduces the discipline and key concepts.
  • Discusses science and technology as well as religious responses.
  • Discusses moral debates and social implications of evolving biotechnologies.
  • Features new, “Posthuman” arts concepts.
  • Peer-reviewed signed chapters are written by eminent scholars. Includes a glossary, bibliographies of worked cited and suggestions for further reading, images/graphics, and an index.
  • Uses extensive academic research.

Alternate Formats

  • Casebound Edition

    ISBN-10: 0028664477 | ISBN-13: 9780028664477

Table of Contents

Introduction: Trans-, Post-, and Emerging Humans: What Do We Mean?
Section 1: How to Think about Science, Technology, and the Future?
Between Progress and Armageddon: The Stakes of Our Times.
Essential Concepts of Science and Technology Studies (STS).
Can We Predict the Middle-Term Future?
Is Mind Uploading a Real Possibility?
The Prehistory of the Posthuman.
Section 2: Science and Technology.
Pharmaceuticals.
Bioelectronics.
Genetics and Epigenetics.
Rejuvenation and Radically Increased Health Spans.
Runaway AI.
A Skeptic’s Perspective: Is this Actually Going to Happen?
Section 3: Religious Responses and New Religiosities.
Buddhist Uploads.
The Russian Cosmists: Evolving into Space.
Virtual Religions and Real Lives.
The Spectrum of Human Techno-Hybridity: The Total Recall Effect.
The Frontiers of Immortality.
The Catholic Tradition and Posthumanism: A Matter of How to Be Human.
Buddhist Biohackers: The New Enlightenment.
Section 4: Moral Debates.
What Is a Person?
Debates over Enhancement.
Commodification of Human Traits: The Body as Industrial Product.
Gender and Bioenhancement.
Animal Bioenhancement.
Human Flourishing: A Moral Yardstick for Evaluating Specific Bioenhancements.
Enhancing Moral Behavior.
Synthetic Biology: The Digital Creation of Life.
Trans/Posthuman Epistemology: Doubt and Back Again.
Section 5: Societal Implications.
What Relevance Does Eugenics Have Today?
Human-Robot Relationships.
Art and the Posthuman.
The Fragmenting of Humankind?
Regulating Bioenhancements: Law and Governance.
The Boundaries of Legal Personhood.
War and Terrorism.
Trans-ecology and Post-sustainability.

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Meet the Author

Author Bio

Michael Bess

Chancellor’s Professor of History at Vanderbilt, Michael has written widely on the interactions between social and cultural processes and technological change.

Diana Walsh Pasulka

Professor and Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Diana has written widely on the topics of the history of religions and the implications of technology and media technologies on religious belief, memory, and practices.