engineering the human condition : history, philosophy and current status /
First Statement of Responsibility
Roberto Manzocco.
.PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC
Place of Publication, Distribution, etc.
Cham, Switzerland :
Name of Publisher, Distributor, etc.
Springer,
Date of Publication, Distribution, etc.
[2019]
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION
Specific Material Designation and Extent of Item
1 online resource
SERIES
Series Title
Springer Praxis books : popular science,
ISSN of Series
2626-6121
INTERNAL BIBLIOGRAPHIES/INDEXES NOTE
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Includes bibliographical references.
CONTENTS NOTE
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Intro; Introduction: Gilgamesh Versus the Dragon-Tyrant; One Man Against Mortality; Hubris, Anyone?; The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant; Negentropy Versus Thermal Death; Spoiler Alert; Contents; 1: Stairways to the Sky; 1.1 Climbing the Slope, Looking for a Purpose; 1.2 The Nietzschean Knot ... ; 1.3 ... and the Futurist One; 1.4 The "Project"; 1.5 Russian Visions ... ; 1.6 ... and Polish Musings; 1.7 Christian Superman; 1.8 The Anglo-American Dream; 2: A New Tower of Babel; 2.1 The Most Radical of the Revolts; 2.2 How It All Started; 2.3 The One Hundred Flowers of Transhumanism
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2.4 Journey Through the Transhumanist Galaxy2.5 Transhumanism, That Is, Never Let Anything Remain Untried; 2.6 The Who's Who of Transhumanism; 2.7 The Pillars of Transhumanism; 2.8 Critique of Transhumanist Reason; 2.9 The Knot of Post-Humanism; 2.10 The Religious Question; 3: Living Forever; 3.1 The Keystone; 3.2 One More Sip of Life; 3.3 A Few Answers from Biology; 3.4 Prometheus Unchained; 3.5 The Phoenix 2.0; 3.6 Three Bridges to Eternity; 3.7 Fighting Aging Today; 4: Plan B; 4.1 Upside Down, in Liquid Nitrogen; 4.2 How Do You Freeze -- pardon me, "Suspend" -- A Patient
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4.3 Cryonics' Prices, Not for the Faint of Heart4.4 The Almighty Science of the Future; 4.5 A History of Cryonics, from Benjamin Franklin to Nano-Machines; 4.6 Science's Take; 4.7 Anthropology of the Average Cryonicist; 5: Nanometer Cornucopia; 5.1 The ABCs of the Nano-world; 5.2 Nano-mania, or the Two Souls of Nanotechnology; 5.3 There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom; 5.4 The Engines of Creation; 5.5 Nano-schism. The Drexler-Smalley Debate, and Beyond; 5.6 Flesh and Computronium; 5.7 The Amazing Bio-medical Nano-machines of Dr. Freitas; 5.8 Nothing Ever Happens in Fog City
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6: The New Flesh Rising6.1 More than Human; 6.2 Genetic Doping, Nootropics and Other Amenities; 6.3 Do-It-Yourself Super-Powers; 6.4 Imagination and Military Power; 6.5 The Flesh of the Future; 7: Colonizing the Mind; 7.1 Behind Our Eyes; 7.2 Neurotechnologies: The State of the Art; 7.3 Escaping from the Body; 7.4 Unlimited Intelligence; 8: The Bright Day of the Soul; 8.1 The Hedonistic Imperative; 8.2 Reprogramming Predators; 8.3 A Nightmarish Brave New World?; 8.4 The Bio-Intelligence Explosion; 8.5 Saving the Multiverse, One Timeline After the Other
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8.6 If you Meet the Buddha on the Road, Engineer Him9: All Hail the Technological Singularity; 9.1 In Thirty Years; 9.2 The People of Tomorrow; 9.3 End of Life: Never; 9.4 Welcome to Weirdtopia; 9.5 After Language; 9.6 Colonizing the Universe in Eight Easy Steps; 9.7 Great Maneuvers at the Border of the Cosmos; 9.8 Hacking the World; 10: The God-Builders; 10.1 The Transhumanist End-Game; 10.2 The Order of the Cosmic Engineers; 10.3 From Transhumanism to Religion, and Back; 10.4 Engineering Transcendence and the Cosmist "Third Way"; 10.5 Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night
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SUMMARY OR ABSTRACT
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This book is designed to offer a comprehensive high-level introduction to transhumanism, an international political and cultural movement that aims to produce a "paradigm shift" in our ethical and political understanding of human evolution. Transhumanist thinkers want the human species to take the course of evolution into its own hands, using advanced technologies currently under development? such as robotics, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, cognitive neurosciences, and nanotechnology? to overcome our present physical and mental limitations, improve our intelligence beyond the current maximum achievable level, acquire skills that are currently the preserve of other species, abolish involuntary aging and death, and ultimately achieve a post-human level of existence. The book covers transhumanism from a historical, philosophical, and scientific viewpoint, tracing its cultural roots, discussing the main philosophical, epistemological, and ethical issues, and reviewing the state of the art in scientific research on the topics of most interest to transhumanists. The writing style is clear and accessible for the general reader, but the book will also appeal to graduate and undergraduate students.