James Hughes Ph.D. Interview
The following interview was conducted with James Hughes Ph.D. Secretary, World Transhumanist Association by Natasha Devine. It originally appeared in issue one of NOCTIGRAM MAGAZINE.
The World Transhumanist Association is an international nonprofit membership organization which advocates the ethical use of technology to expand human capacities. They claim to support the development of and access to new technologies that enable everyone to enjoy better minds, better bodies and better lives.
Visit the WTA online: www.transhumanism.org
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INTERVIEW:
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1.Your website states: “The WTA has three core programs of activity: * The Rights of the Person * Longer, Better Lives * Future Friendly Culture” could you expand a little bit on how you define “programs of activity”-what type(s) of “activities” are members of the WTA involved in? Do you plan to promote these concepts not only internally to your organization / movement, but externally to the “general public”? If so, in what ways?
Both to the public and internally:
- Campaign for the Rights of the Person
A campaign to modify national laws and international human rights
conventions to establish (a) that bodily autonomy, reproductive rights,
and cognitive liberty should be explicitly recognized and protected, (b)
that universal access to enabling technologies is a right in itself, and
a precondition for all other rights, and that (c) personhood is the
basis of rights-bearing, not humanness or the human genome.
Specific goals:
(a) Expanded access to reproductive health technologies (contraception,
fertility, prenatal testing, abortion, and germinal choice).
(b) Liberalized psychoactive drug laws, and support for research into
cognitive enhancement technologies, vaccines and treatments for
substance dependence, and safer psychoactive substances.
(c) Extension of human-level rights protections to great apes.
Action items:
(a) Support and outreach to drug law reform efforts, reproductive rights
campaigns, transgender rights, access to treatment and assistive devices
for the disabled, and extending rights to great apes
(b) A conference at the United Nations in New York in April 2007,
co-sponsored with the IEET and the IHEU Bioethics office at the United
Nations
(c) Advertise and build the wta-disability list.
(d) Publish pamphlets on H+ and disability, transgender, repro rights,
drug law reform and great apes.
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- Campaign for Longer Better Lives
A campaign for a multinational research program to develop therapies to
slow aging.
Specific Goals:
Have the National Institutes of Health in the United States, and
parallel agencies in the rest of the world, endorse and commit to
anti-aging research programs to secure the “Longevity Dividend.”
Action items:
(a) Letter writing, public forums, conferences in support of the
Longevity Dividend initiative, SENS and parallel initiatives, in
coalition with anti-aging and related groups.
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- Campaign for a Future Friendly Culture
A campaign to encourage balanced and constructive portrayals of
longevity, human enhancement and emerging technologies in popular
culture.
Specific goals:
(a) Solicit offensive and counterproductive portrayals of longevity,
human enhancement and emerging technologies, and encourage our
membership, chapters and allies to dialogue with the authors, producers
and distributors.
(b) Increase the sensitivity of culture creators and consumers to the
biopolitical messages and bioconservative tropes in popular culture.
(c) Arrange letter-writing, protests, and boycotts of especially
offensive films, television programs and books.
(d) Encoruage and promote transhumanist artists, authors, film-makers,
game designers and culture creators.
Action items:
(a) Advertise and build the wta-arts list and Transhumanist Arts
Gallery.
(b) Encourage members and chapters to report positive and negative
portrayals of human enhancement, longevity, emerging technologies and
posthumanity to the wta-arts list.
(c) Post critiques of bioconservative popular culture on the WTA
website, and examples of more complex and constructive visions of the
future.
(c) Send representatives to speak at appropriate meetings, such as
conferences on science fiction and popular culture, and organize panels
at SF cons on the need for more complex protrayals of a posthuman
future.
(d) Arrange fora and meetings with authors, artists and culture creators
to discuss the biopolitical messages in popular culture, and heighten
their sensitivity to bioconservative tropes and biases.
2.Also on your website it states: “Transhumanists place a high value on autonomy: the ability and right of individuals to plan and choose their own lives.” It also says:”Transhumanism does not support any particular party, politician or political platform. ”
Do you think that your group, by default, promotes non-sectarian Anarchism?
No, although most members are staunch civil libertarians and we do have both right-wing (libertarian) and left-wing anarchists in the movement.
Our 2005 membership survey found this distribution of politics among our membership:
–Aside from the idea that new technologies should/would not only benefit the rich and powerful, there is no specific political leaning (left/right) in the texts provided online by the WTA. Are transhumanists beyond the need for politics, policy and politcal “systems” altogether?
No. We’ve certainly demonstrated the need for accountable democratic process internally, and we generally support the creation of a more democratic world order.
3.”Transhumanism advocates the well- being of all sentience (whether in artificial intellects, humans, posthumans, or non- human animals)” ….What are the possible “moral repercussions” of protecting the rights of “Artificial Intellects” who may not have the same “morals” and/or “ethics” programmed into them? Will we put malfunctioning murderous machines on trial and send them to prison? If so, How will the cost of this be subsidized in a PostHuman society?
Most transhumanists imagine that machine minds will eventually either transcend organic human existence and understanding altogether, or be integrated as co-equal citizens, or both (depending on their limitations and interests). For instance uploaded human minds may stick around as citizens, while Singularity AIs may flit off into the galaxy, or try to eat the planet. In any case they we generally think they should be held as culpable for crimes as any other intelligent person, so yes, we would have to figure out how to rehabilitate or punish them.
4.From your site’s article entitled “A guide to hosting your own transhumanist arts center”:
“Image is everything. Transhumanists should always strive to be seen as people of style and tech sophistication: the embodiment of the geek AND chic.” Can anyone truly define what is “Transhumanist Art” without being an “art fascist”?
Meaning: Art is subjective. If an artist believes his/her work is somehow supportive of new technologies that enable everyone to enjoy better minds, better bodies and better lives (perhaps they use a new form of electronic airbrush to paint a red banana), is it not considered “Transhumanist Art” if it doesn’t look “futuristic” and “stylish” enough? Who/what defines it?
We’ve had many debates about that. A minority argue that there is a specific transhumanist aesthetic, but most would acknowledge that transhumanist aspirations and sensibility has been and will be expressed in many different aesthetic genres. As to whether it becomes authoritarian, thats a slippery slope potential for every artistic sensibility. Feminist, socialist, Futurist, Situationist and Realist artists have all had the same debates. Insofar as we are pretty radically individualistic, I think we are less prone to aesthetic heavy-handedness and tribalism.
5.From your organization’s Point of View, What is the Transhumanist view of Religion? What do you think of certain religions that identify as “Transhumanist”?
Transhumanism is not a religion in itself, and is more or less compatible with many faiths, although two thirds of transhumanists identify as secular or atheist. But among the other third there is every type of faith group. Although we have strong ties to and rootedness in secularism, freethought and humanism, we understand that it is very important strategically to encourage transhumanists in all faith communities to be public about their beliefs, to identify the ways in which transhumanism is consistent or in conflict with their traditions, and to establish faith-based transhumanist groups – such as the Mormon Transhumanist Association – to encourage openness to human enhancement from their faith perspectives. From that point of view it is not helpful for marginal groups to claim the mantle of being the or a “transhumanist religion.” That said transhumanists with a spiritual interest – such as myself – are more likely to be in humanistic faiths such as Buddhism or Unitarian Univeralism than in more rigid theistic groups such as Catholicism or Islam. There are also some aspects of transhumanist eschatology which are interpreted as quasi-religious – a utopian future, immortality, transcendent mental states, etc.
–Will there still be room in a PostHuman world for any of the trappings of Religion, as it exists thus far in its various forms?
Some assume the secularization thesis, that people will let go off religion as they smarter and better educated. Others presume a continuing proliferation and evolution of the religious form, incoroporating the new realities of transhuman existence.
6.With all the emphasis on the “geek factor”, it may seem to some “outsiders” that Transhumanism is an elitist movement only welcoming of Mensa candidates and well-educated isolationists. Is there an element of discrimination against “stupid people” (those with lower IQs than yourself) to the Transhumanist movement? What will be done with the mentally handicapped in the world of Homo Excelsior?
There are some smart male transhumanists who are intolerant of people (who they presume to have) lesser capacities, just as smart males tend to do in any subculture. But on the whole the transhumanist movement isn’t just for smart people, nor is it discriminatory against the non-smart. While the range of technical interests that lead people to transhumanist convictions have in the past been confined to very educated scientifically-literate people, they are now becoming matters of everyday debate.
We assume that most people, given the opportunity, will choose greater intelligence for themselves and their children, and that it should be a goal of social policy to reduce the incidence of retardation and to increase the capacities of all citizens, which is in fact the goal of all societies. We doubt that there will be IQ ceilings implemented, and we would be opposed to them if there were. That said, it will be difficult for those who refuse to avail themselves or their children of cognitive enhancement to compete for higher education, work and in the arts, but thats already true of things like literacy – we don’t argue that no one should learn to read because the illterate find it hard to get a job, we try to get them to learn to read.
7.And Finally, the Doomsday Question: What Happens to the remaining stubborn “Humans” when the majority has become “PostHuman”? What if some refuse to “advance”, are they to be “left behind”?
We’ve been able to accomodate the Amish, and most presume that it will be possible to accomodate refuseniks in a transhuman future. In more extreme scenarios however the gap between the persistently homo sapien and the posthumans becomes so great that the question is more akin to the relationship of human beings to animals, with the hope that they will have a godlike sense of noblesse oblige and nostalgic regard for the “left behind.”
Hope that helps.
James Hughes Ph.D.
Secretary, World Transhumanist Association
http://transhumanism.org
Williams 229B, Trinity College
300 Summit St., Hartford CT 06106
(office) 860-297-2376
[email protected]