Transhumanism is a recent movement that extols mans right to shape his own evolution, by maximizing the use of scientific technologies, to enhance human physical and intellectual potential. While the name is new, the idea has long been a popular theme of science fiction, featured in such films as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, the Terminator series, and more recently, The Matrix, Limitless, Her and Transcendence.

However, as its adherents hint at in their own publications, transhumanism is an occult project, rooted in Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry, and derived from the Kabbalah, which asserts that humanity is evolving intellectually, towards a point in time when man will become God. Modeled on the medieval legend of the Golem and Frankenstein, they believe man will be able to create life itself, in the form of living machines, or artificial intelligence.

Spearheaded by the Cybernetics Group, the project resulted in both the development of the modern computer and MK-Ultra, the CIAs mind-control program. MK-Ultra promoted the mind-expanding potential of psychedelic drugs, to shape the counterculture of the 1960s, based on the notion that the shamans of ancient times used psychoactive substances, equated with the apple of the Tree of Knowledge.

And, as revealed in the movie Lucy, through the use of smart drugs, and what transhumanists call mind uploading, man will be able to merge with the Internet, which is envisioned as the end-point of Kabbalistic evolution, the formation of a collective consciousness, or Global Brain. That awaited moment is what Ray Kurzweil, a director of engineering at Google, refers to as The Singularly. By accumulating the total of human knowledge, and providing access to every aspect of human activity, the Internet will supposedly achieve omniscience, becoming the God of occultism, or the Masonic All-Seeing Eye of the reverse side of the American dollar bill.

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Transhumanism: The History of a Dangerous Idea: David ...

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Transhumanism - International Centre/Center for Bioethics ...

From transhuman, to transhumanism: What is the definition, and what is the movement that it inspires? This page will serve as an overview. We are talking about the next stage of human evolution; the immortalization of humanity; a future where human and machine is one in the same.

[social_share/] The popularity of transhumanism as an ideology has arguably been on an exponentialrise since the 1990s, as is most notable in the graph below. The graph displays the frequency of which the word transhumanism has featured in published books. We have displayed this graph to compare it to the use of the simple, more ideologically free word transhuman.

By simple definition, transhuman is defined onWikipedia as an intermediary form between the human and the hypothetical posthuman. We add complexity with the simple Oxford definition of transhuman/transhumanist The belief or theory that the human race can evolve beyond its current physical and mental limitations, especially by means of science and technology. I argue that this is as far as the definition of a transhumanist should go. It is merely a person who agrees humanity should have the freedom to enhance itself through its merger with technology.

Political scientist, Francis Fukuyama,describes transhumanismas the worlds most dangerous idea. Countering this, science writerRonald Bailey asserts that it is amovement that epitomizes the most daring, courageous, imaginative, and idealistic aspirations of humanity.

What the above commenters fail to understand itthat both arguments stand true. In humanities aspiration for transhuman evolution, we will face huge dangers. Failing to understand those dangers because of over optimism is just as dangerous as ignorantly fighting against innovation though pessimistic fear/paranoia.

I argue that the optimistic/pessimistic contrast has a charging effect for the calls for transhumanist defence/attack. This in effect encourages people to define transhumanism beyond its pure definition.

In explaining this, its advocates sometimes say that we are all transhumanists, said Cook. We use glasses; we wear dentures; we take caffeine; we have pacemakers. This is true, but the nub of transhumanism is extending human capacities, not just repairing defects in the way we are now.http://www.catholicworldreport.com/Item/2616/the_surprising_spread_and_cultural_impact_of_transhumanism.aspx

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Transhumanism News - That's Really Possible

Put simply Transhumanism is the belief that technology can allow us to improve, enhance and overcome the limits of our biology. More specifically, transhumanists such as Max More, Natasha Vita-More and Ray Kurzweil believe that by merging man and machine via biotechnology, molecular nanotechnologies, and artificial intelligence, one day science will yield humans that have increased cognitive abilities, are physically stronger, emotionally more stable and have indefinite life-spans. This path, they say, will eventually lead to "posthuman" intelligent (augmented) beings far superior to man - a near embodiment of god.

Transhumanism 101 with Natasha Vita-More

Transhumanism is both misunderstood and feared. Ignorant people with an ideological agenda have gone as far as labeling it "the most dangerous idea." I thought that it is time to bring some basic intellectual clarity on the topic and who is better prepared to help us do that but "the first female philosopher of transhumanism"!?

Max More - The Singularity and Transhumanism

Some of the main issues here are:

Can humanity continue to survive and prosper by embracing technology or will technology eventually bring forth the end of the human race altogether?

Will humanity get polarized into neo-luddite technophobes (such as Samuel Butler and Ted Kaczynski) or transhumanist technophiles (such as Max More, Natasha Vita-More, Ray Kurzweil, Hans Moravec and Nick Bostrom)?

Does that mean that wide spread global conflict may be impossible to avoid?

Is transhumanism turning into a new "religion" for certain scientists? (with "prophets" such as Ray Kurzweil and Vernor Vinge) Or, is it a viable scientific hypothesis?

Who will be the dominant species?

What is the essence of being human?

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Transhumanism and the Technological Singularity

Transhumanism, Ethics, and the Internet: A Dispatch from the "Transhuman Visions" conference

By Brian Green

Transhumanism is a contemporary worldview whose proponents seek to radically extend human life and grant humans enhancements in an effort to render them as powerful as possible. The first-ever Transhuman Visions conference, organized by Hank Pellissier of the Brighter Brains Institute, met on February 1, 2014, in San Francisco, California. I attended because I have longstanding academic interests in the technological, religious, sociological, psychological, and ethical aspects of transhumanism.

The very first speaker at the conference, Roen Horn, reflected some of the complex religious aspects of transhumanism; he used a lot of Christian imagery, while at the same time denying that we can appeal to a (possibly imaginary) God for our immortality. In his view, if we want to be immortal, we have to do it on our own. Atheism, anti-theism, agnosticism, and new age spirituality were subtexts in many of the presentations. Horn's use of the catch phrase "eternal life pirates never surrender" also presented something of both the whimsy and the seriousness of the movement.

Another speaker, Rich Lee, was a "grinder" a devotee of do-it-yourself technological body modification. He had inserted magnetic implants in his own body in order to augment his own sensory perception, and electronic RFID chips into his hands so as to wirelessly control locks and other items that require identification to operate. Transhumanism and extreme body modification share the idea of the manipulability of the human body in accord with the human will. This is a movement that might grow in popularity yet remain somewhat limited in its appeal, at least for the near-termas tattoos and body modification currently remain.

Several speakers discussed ways to increase health and longevity. Caloric restriction is the only well-proven way to extend life, but very few people actually follow it, since it is rather unpleasant. These speakers discussed a few ways, such as periodic fasting, to get some of the perceived benefits of caloric restriction without having to actually starve oneself. Among other things, the speakers also recommended wearing orange glasses in the evenings in order to prevent artificial lights from interfering with natural bodily rhythms that promote a good night's sleep.

Aubrey de Grey was the most prominent speaker at the conference. Something of a celebrity in the radical life-extension community, de Grey discussed ways to popularize the life-extension movement so as to gain more funding for its research. He argued that significant gains could be made with just $50 billion invested in anti-aging research. One clever audience member asked if de Grey would shave his long beard for a crowd-funded $5 million donation, to which de Grey replied "yes!" and then even lowered the bar to $1 million; what happens to his beard remains to be seen.

Perhaps the most interesting speaker, and one who gained great applause from the audience, was Randal Koene, who discussed his initiative to get all those working in fields relevant to "whole brain emulation" (WBE) to cooperate in their efforts. Transhumanists see WBE as a kind of Holy Grail of life extension because they believe it will allow them to upload their minds into computers and thus attain complete immortality, with humans living inside a computer network as "substrate independent minds" (SIMs). Personally, I am skeptical of the relevance of this idea to life extension, since WBEs in a computer will not be "alive" in any biological sense (a rather key aspect of "life extension")nor do I think minds can be substrate independent. Of more relevance for life extension is neural prosthetic technology, which allows brain damage to be repaired through brain-computer interfaces. This technology is actually progressing very rapidly, with brain damaged tissue already electronically restored in animals. One might reasonably ask where the dividing line between neuroprosthetics and WBE might be: How much brain has to be replaced before the prosthetic is your brain? Could a brain-dead person be restored to life with a partial or whole-brain prostheses? But these questions will not be resolved by debate but by actual experiments.

Another speaker at the conference, Zoltan Istvan, proposed the idea that those who speak out against transhumanism might be committing a crime because they are advocating a worldview that will lead to many deaths. Perhaps such speech should be banned, he proposed. Needless to say, such a course of action would raise some grave ethical questions. This type of thinking, which could perhaps lead to a type of totalitarian transhumanism, is something that I had not heard much about before.

Utopianism was a definite ethical theme at the conference. For transhumanists, Utopia means humanity without death and with godlike powers. Utopia is a "greatest good," all other goods are subordinate to it, including, as noted above, the pleasure of eating, the absence of pain from body modifications, existence as a body of flesh, and perhaps even freedoms (of speech, etc.). As an infinite good, however, Utopia can be used to morally justify anything (by arguing that in the face of an infinite good any finite evil is negligible). This can be extremely dangerous.

While transhumanism has existed primarily as an Internet-based movement for a couple of decades now, the Transhuman Visions conference was an event intended to build face to face human relationships. As the movement has grown in popularity, especially in the tech-friendly Bay Area, it has finally passed a critical threshold, so that now in-person contact starts to make sense for those interested in it. The conference had approximately 300 attendees.

As for me, I am a transhumanism enthusiast, but also a skeptic. While I see no intrinsic moral problems with extending healthy human life as long as we can (realizing that important related questions of justice, cost, accessibility, side-effects, etc., would also need to be addressed), I do not think material immortality is possible in this world. As material creatures subject to entropy, we must eventually break down and die. The existential denial of our own mortality is an evasion, not a solution. But transhumanism does not stop at evasion; it is a social movement with a lot of highly motivated and intelligent people, and is actively researching solutions of many types. I was very impressed by several of the people I spoke to. Some were there because they were deeply concerned about the health of their loved ones and they saw transhumanism as the chance to save their loved one's lives.

Research into extending healthy life is a worthy task and not one to be discouraged. While the extreme search for immortality is, I think, futile, and futile acts can be morally problematic, the general effort to extend life is not futile, and is certainly something that would interest many people. Significantly lengthened lifespans will likely not appear quickly, but by a long slow process of medical advance, and those individual medical advances, compounding over time, will be a very good thing.

Brian Green is assistant director of campus ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics and an adjunct professor teaching ethics in the SCU Graduate School of Engineering.

February 2014

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Transhumanism, Ethics, and the Internet

B&E, since i make baseless accusations on the dark ages and christians slaughtering thousands in the name of god. I will let history talk for me: Listed are only events that solely occurred on command of church authorities or were committed in the name of Christianity. (List incomplete)

Ancient Pagans As soon as Christianity was legal (315), more and more pagan temples were destroyed by Christian mob. Pagan priests were killed. Between 315 and 6th century thousands of pagan believers were slain. Examples of destroyed Temples: the Sanctuary of Aesculap in Aegaea, the Temple of Aphrodite in Golgatha, Aphaka in Lebanon, the Heliopolis. Christian priests such as Mark of Arethusa or Cyrill of Heliopolis were famous as temple destroyer. [DA468] Pagan services became punishable by death in 356. [DA468] Christian Emperor Theodosius (408-450) even had children executed, because they had been playing with remains of pagan statues. [DA469] According to Christian chroniclers he followed meticulously all Christian teachings In 6th century pagans were declared void of all rights. In the early fourth century the philosopher Sopatros was executed on demand of Christian authorities. [DA466] The world famous female philosopher Hypatia of Alexandria was torn to pieces with glass fragments by a hysterical Christian mob led by a Christian minister named Peter, in a church, in 415. [DO19-25]

Mission Emperor Karl (Charlemagne) in 782 had 4500 Saxons, unwilling to convert to Christianity, beheaded. [DO30] Peasants of Steding (Germany) unwilling to pay suffocating church taxes: between 5,000 and 11,000 men, women and children slain 5/27/1234 near Altenesch/Germany. [WW223] Battle of Belgrad 1456: 80,000 Turks slaughtered. [DO235] 15th century Poland: 1019 churches and 17987 villages plundered by Knights of the Order. Victims unknown. [DO30] 16th and 17th century Ireland. English troops pacified and civilized Ireland, where only Gaelic wild Irish, unreasonable beasts lived without any knowledge of God or good manners, in common of their goods, cattle, women, children and every other thing. One of the more successful soldiers, a certain Humphrey Gilbert, half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh, ordered that the heddes of all those (of what sort soever thei were) which were killed in the daie, should be cutte off from their bodies and should bee laied on the ground by eche side of the waie, which effort to civilize the Irish indeed caused greate terrour to the people when thei sawe the heddes of their dedde fathers, brothers, children, kinsfolke, and freinds on the grounde. Tens of thousands of Gaelic Irish fell victim to the carnage. [SH99, 225]

Crusades (1095-1291) First Crusade: 1095 on command of pope Urban II. [WW11-41] Semlin/Hungary 6/24/96 thousands slain. Wieselburg/Hungary 6/12/96 thousands. [WW23] 9/9/96-9/26/96 Nikaia, Xerigordon (then turkish), thousands respectively. [WW25-27] Until Jan 1098 a total of 40 capital cities and 200 castles conquered (number of slain unknown) [WW30] after 6/3/98 Antiochia (then turkish) conquered, between 10,000 and 60,000 slain. 6/28/98 100,000 Turks (incl. women & children) killed. [WW32-35] Here the Christians did no other harm to the women found in [the enemys] tentssave that they ran their lances through their bellies, according to Christian chronicler Fulcher of Chartres. [EC60] Marra (Maraat an-numan) 12/11/98 thousands killed. Because of the subsequent famine the already stinking corpses of the enemies were eaten by the Christians said chronicler Albert Aquensis. [WW36] Jerusalem conquered 7/15/1099 more than 60,000 victims (jewish, muslim, men, women, children). [WW37-40] (In the words of one witness: there [in front of Solomons temple] was such a carnage that our people were wading ankle-deep in the blood of our foes, and after that happily and crying for joy our people marched to our Saviours tomb, to honour it and to pay off our debt of gratitude) The Archbishop of Tyre, eye-witness, wrote: It was impossible to look upon the vast numbers of the slain without horror; everywhere lay fragments of human bodies, and the very ground was covered with the blood of the slain. It was not alone the spectacle of headless bodies and mutilated limbs strewn in all directions that roused the horror of all who looked upon them. Still more dreadful was it to gaze upon the victors themselves, dripping with blood from head to foot, an ominous sight which brought terror to all who met them. It is reported that within the Temple enclosure alone about ten thousand infidels perished. [TG79] Christian chronicler Eckehard of Aura noted that even the following summer in all of palestine the air was polluted by the stench of decomposition. One million victims of the first crusade alone. [WW41] Battle of Askalon, 8/12/1099. 200,000 heathens slaughtered in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ. [WW45] Fourth crusade: 4/12/1204 Constantinople sacked, number of victims unknown, numerous thousands, many of them Christian. [WW141-148] Rest of Crusades in less detail: until the fall of Akkon 1291 probably 20 million victims (in the Holy land and Arab/Turkish areas alone). [WW224] Note: All figures according to contemporary (Christian) chroniclers.

Heretics Already in 385 C.E. the first Christians, the Spanish Priscillianus and six followers, were beheaded for heresy in Trier/Germany [DO26] Manichaean heresy: a crypto-Christian sect decent enough to practice birth control (and thus not as irresponsible as faithful Catholics) was exterminated in huge campaigns all over the Roman empire between 372 C.E. and 444 C.E. Numerous thousands of victims. [NC] Albigensians: the first Crusade intended to slay other Christians. [DO29] The Albigensiansviewed themselves as good Christians, but would not accept roman Catholic rule, and taxes, and prohibition of birth control. [NC] Begin of violence: on command of pope Innocent III (greatest single pre-nazi mass murderer) in 1209. Bezirs (today France) 7/22/1209 destroyed, all the inhabitants were slaughtered. Victims (including Catholics refusing to turn over their heretic neighbours and friends) 20,000-70,000. [WW179-181] Carcassonne 8/15/1209, thousands slain. Other cities followed. [WW181] subsequent 20 years of war until nearly all Cathars (probably half the population of the Languedoc, today southern France) were exterminated. [WW183] After the war ended (1229) the Inquisition was founded 1232 to search and destroy surviving/hiding heretics. Last Cathars burned at the stake 1324. [WW183] Estimated one million victims (cathar heresy alone), [WW183] Other heresies: Waldensians, Paulikians, Runcarians, Josephites, and many others. Most of these sects exterminated, (I believe some Waldensians live today, yet they had to endure 600 years of persecution) I estimate at least hundred thousand victims (including the Spanish inquisition but excluding victims in the New World). Spanish Inquisitor Torquemada alone allegedly responsible for 10,220 burnings. [DO28] John Huss, a critic of papal infallibility and indulgences, was burned at the stake in 1415. [LI475-522] University professor B.Hubmaier burned at the stake 1538 in Vienna. [DO59] Giordano Bruno, Dominican monk, after having been incarcerated for seven years, was burned at the stake for heresy on the Campo dei Fiori (Rome) on 2/17/1600.

Witches from the beginning of Christianity to 1484 probably more than several thousand. in the era of witch hunting (1484-1750) according to modern scholars several hundred thousand (about 80% female) burned at the stake or hanged. [WV] incomplete list of documented cases: The Burning of Witches A Chronicle of the Burning Times. Religious Wars

15th century: Crusades against Hussites, thousands slain. [DO30] 1538 pope Paul III declared Crusade against apostate England and all English as slaves of Church (fortunately had not power to go into action). [DO31] 1568 Spanish Inquisition Tribunal ordered extermination of 3 million rebels in (then Spanish) Netherlands. Thousands were actually slain. [DO31] 1572 In France about 20,000 Huguenots were killed on command of pope Pius V. Until 17th century 200,000 flee. [DO31] 17th century: Catholics slay Gaspard de Coligny, a Protestant leader. After murdering him, the Catholic mob mutilated his body, cutting off his head, his hands, and his genitals and then dumped him into the river [but] then, deciding that it was not worthy of being food for the fish, they hauled it out again [ and] dragged what was left to the gallows of Montfaulcon, to be meat and carrion for maggots and crows. [SH191] 17th century: Catholics sack the city of Magdeburg/Germany: roughly 30,000 Protestants were slain. In a single church fifty women were found beheaded, reported poet Friedrich Schiller, and infants still sucking the breasts of their lifeless mothers. [SH191] 17th century 30 years war (Catholic vs. Protestant): at least 40% of population decimated, mostly in Germany. [DO31-32] Jews

Already in the 4th and 5th centuries synagogues were burned by Christians. Number of Jews slain unknown. In the middle of the fourth century the first synagogue was destroyed on command of bishop Innocentius of Dertona in Northern Italy. The first synagogue known to have been burned down was near the river Euphrat, on command of the bishop of Kallinikon in the year 388. [DA450] 17. Council of Toledo 694: Jews were enslaved, their property confiscated, and their children forcibly baptized. [DA454] The Bishop of Limoges (France) in 1010 had the cities Jews, who would not convert to Christianity, expelled or killed. [DA453] First Crusade: Thousands of Jews slaughtered 1096, maybe 12.000 total. Places: Worms 5/18/1096, Mainz 5/27/1096 (1100 persons), Cologne, Neuss, Altenahr, Wevelinghoven, Xanten, Moers, Dortmund, Kerpen, Trier, Metz, Regensburg, Prag and others (All locations Germany except Metz/France, Prag/Czech) [EJ] Second Crusade: 1147. Several hundred Jews were slain in Ham, Sully, Carentan, and Rameru (all locations in France). [WW57] Third Crusade: English Jewish communities sacked 1189/90. [DO40] Fulda/Germany 1235: 34 Jewish men and women slain. [DO41] 1257, 1267: Jewish communities of London, Canterbury, Northampton, Lincoln, Cambridge, and others exterminated. [DO41] 1290 in Bohemian (Poland) allegedly 10,000 Jews killed. [DO41] 1337 Starting in Deggendorf/Germany a Jew-killing craze reaches 51 towns in Bavaria, Austria, Poland. [DO41] 1348 All Jews of Basel/Switzerland and Strasbourg/France (two thousand) burned. [DO41] 1349 In more than 350 towns in Germany all Jews murdered, mostly burned alive (in this one year more Jews were killed than Christians in 200 years of ancient Roman persecution of Christians). [DO42] 1389 In Prag 3,000 Jews were slaughtered. [DO42] 1391 Sevilles Jews killed (Archbishop Martinez leading). 4,000 were slain, 25,000 sold as slaves. [DA454] Their identification was made easy by the brightly colored badges of shame that all jews above the age of ten had been forced to wear. 1492: In the year Columbus set sail to conquer a New World, more than 150,000 Jews were expelled from Spain, many died on their way: 6/30/1492. [MM470-476] 1648 Chmielnitzki massacres: In Poland about 200,000 Jews were slain. [DO43] (I feel sick ) this goes on and on, century after century, right into the kilns of Auschwitz.

Native Peoples

Beginning with Columbus (a former slave trader and would-be Holy Crusader) the conquest of the New World began, as usual understood as a means to propagate Christianity. Within hours of landfall on the first inhabited island he encountered in the Caribbean, Columbus seized and carried off six native people who, he said, ought to be good servants [and] would easily be made Christians, because it seemed to me that they belonged to no religion. [SH200] While Columbus described the Indians as idolators and slaves, as many as [the Crown] shall order, his pal Michele de Cuneo, Italian nobleman, referred to the natives as beasts because they eat when they are hungry, and made love openly whenever they feel like it. [SH204-205] On every island he set foot on, Columbus planted a cross, making the declarations that are required the requerimiento to claim the ownership for his Catholic patrons in Spain. And nobody objected. If the Indians refused or delayed their acceptance (or understanding), the requerimiento continued: I certify to you that, with the help of God, we shall powerfully enter in your country and shall make war against you and shall subject you to the yoke and obedience of the Church and shall do you all mischief that we can, as to vassals who do not obey and refuse to receive their lord and resist and contradict him. [SH66]

Likewise in the words of John Winthrop, first governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony: justifieinge the undertakeres of the intended Plantation in New England to carry the Gospell into those parts of the world, and to raise a Bulworke against the kingdome of the Ante-Christ. [SH235] In average two thirds of the native population were killed by colonist-imported smallpox before violence began. This was a great sign of the marvelous goodness and providence of God to the Christians of course, e.g. the Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony wrote in 1634, as for the natives, they are near all dead of the smallpox, so as the Lord hath cleared our title to what we possess. [SH109,238] On Hispaniola alone, on Columbus visits, the native population (Arawak), a rather harmless and happy people living on an island of abundant natural resources, a literal paradise, soon mourned 50,000 dead. [SH204] The surviving Indians fell victim to rape, murder, enslavement and spanish raids. As one of the culprits wrote: So many Indians died that they could not be counted, all through the land the Indians lay dead everywhere. The stench was very great and pestiferous. [SH69] The indian chief Hatuey fled with his people but was captured and burned alive. As they were tying him to the stake a Franciscan friar urged him to take Jesus to his heart so that his soul might go to heaven, rather than descend into hell. Hatuey replied that if heaven was where the Christians went, he would rather go to hell. [SH70] What happened to his people was described by an eyewitness: The Spaniards found pleasure in inventing all kinds of odd cruelties They built a long gibbet, long enough for the toes to touch the ground to prevent strangling, and hanged thirteen [natives] at a time in honor of Christ Our Saviour and the twelve Apostles then, straw was wrapped around their torn bodies and they were burned alive. [SH72] Or, on another occasion: The Spaniards cut off the arm of one, the leg or hip of another, and from some their heads at one stroke, like butchers cutting up beef and mutton for market. Six hundred, including the cacique, were thus slain like brute beastsVasco [de Balboa] ordered forty of them to be torn to pieces by dogs. [SH83] The islands population of about eight million people at the time of Columbuss arrival in 1492 already had declined by a third to a half before the year 1496 was out. Eventually all the islands natives were exterminated, so the Spaniards were forced to import slaves from other caribbean islands, who soon suffered the same fate. Thus the Caribbeans millions of native people [were] thereby effectively liquidated in barely a quarter of a century. [SH72-73] In less than the normal lifetime of a single human being, an entire culture of millions of people, thousands of years resident in their homeland, had been exterminated. [SH75] And then the Spanish turned their attention to the mainland of Mexico and Central America. The slaughter had barely begun. The exquisite city of Tenochtitln [Mexico city] was next. [SH75] Cortez, Pizarro, De Soto and hundreds of other spanish conquistadors likewise sacked southern and mesoamerican civilizations in the name of Christ (De Soto also sacked Florida). When the 16th century ended, some 200,000 Spaniards had moved to the Americas. By that time probably more than 60,000,000 natives were dead. [SH95] Of course no different were the founders of what today is the US of Amerikkka.

Although none of the settlers would have survived winter without native help, they soon set out to expel and exterminate the Indians. Warfare among (north American) Indians was rather harmless, in comparison to European standards, and was meant to avenge insults rather than conquer land. In the words of some of the pilgrim fathers: Their Warres are farre less bloudy, so that there usually was no great slawter of nether side. Indeed, they might fight seven yeares and not kill seven men. What is more, the Indians usually spared women and children. [SH111] In the spring of 1612 some English colonists found life among the (generally friendly and generous) natives attractive enough to leave Jamestown being idell did runne away unto the Indyans, to live among them (that probably solved a sex problem). Governor Thomas Dale had them hunted down and executed: Some he apointed (sic) to be hanged Some burned Some to be broken upon wheles, others to be staked and some shott to deathe. [SH105] Of course these elegant measures were restricted for fellow englishmen: This was the treatment for those who wished to act like Indians. For those who had no choice in the matter, because they were the native people of Virginia methods were different: when an Indian was accused by an Englishman of stealing a cup and failing to return it, the English response was to attack the natives in force, burning the entire community down. [SH105] On the territory that is now Massachusetts the founding fathers of the colonies were committing genocide, in what has become known as the Peqout War. The killers were New England Puritan Christians, refugees from persecution in their own home country England. When however, a dead colonist was found, apparently killed by Narragansett Indians, the Puritan colonists wanted revenge. Despite the Indian chiefs pledge they attacked. Somehow they seem to have lost the idea of what they were after, because when they were greeted by Pequot Indians (long-time foes of the Narragansetts) the troops nevertheless made war on the Pequots and burned their villages. The puritan commander-in-charge John Mason after one massacre wrote: And indeed such a dreadful Terror did the Almighty let fall upon their Spirits, that they would fly from us and run into the very Flames, where many of them perished God was above them, who laughed his Enemies and the Enemies of his People to Scorn, making them as a fiery Oven Thus did the Lord judge among the Heathen, filling the Place with dead Bodies: men, women, children. [SH113-114] So the Lord was pleased to smite our Enemies in the hinder Parts, and to give us their land for an inheritance. [SH111]. Because of his readers assumed knowledge of Deuteronomy, there was no need for Mason to quote the words that immediately follow: Thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth. But thou shalt utterly destroy them (Deut 20) Masons comrade Underhill recalled how great and doleful was the bloody sight to the view of the young soldiers yet reassured his readers that sometimes the Scripture declareth women and children must perish with their parents. [SH114] Other Indians were killed in successful plots of poisoning. The colonists even had dogs especially trained to kill Indians and to devour children from their mothers breasts, in the colonists own words: blood Hounds to draw after them, and Mastives to seaze them. (This was inspired by spanish methods of the time) In this way they continued until the extermination of the Pequots was near. [SH107-119] The surviving handful of Indians were parceled out to live in servitude. John Endicott and his pastor wrote to the governor asking for a share of the captives, specifically a young woman or girle and a boy if you thinke good. [SH115] Other tribes were to follow the same path. Comment the Christian exterminators: Gods Will, which will at last give us cause to say: How Great is His Goodness! and How Great is his Beauty! Thus doth the Lord Jesus make them to bow before him, and to lick the Dust! [TA] Like today, lying was OK to Christians then. Peace treaties were signed with every intention to violate them: when the Indians grow secure uppon (sic) the treatie, advised the Council of State in Virginia, we shall have the better Advantage both to surprise them, & cutt downe theire Corne. [SH106] In 1624 sixty heavily armed Englishmen cut down 800 defenseless Indian men, women and children. [SH107] In a single massacre in King Philips War of 1675 and 1676 some 600 Indians were destroyed. A delighted Cotton Mather, revered pastor of the Second Church in Boston, later referred to the slaughter as a barbeque. [SH115] To summarize: Before the arrival of the English, the western Abenaki people in New Hampshire and Vermont had numbered 12,000. Less than half a century later about 250 remained alive a destruction rate of 98%. The Pocumtuck people had numbered more than 18,000, fifty years later they were down to 920 95% destroyed. The Quiripi-Unquachog people had numbered about 30,000, fifty years later they were down to 1500 95% destroyed. The Massachusetts people had numbered at least 44,000, fifty years later barely 6000 were alive 81% destroyed. [SH118] These are only a few examples of the multitude of tribes living before Christian colonists set their foot on the New World. All this was before the smallpox epidemics of 1677 and 1678 had occurred. And the carnage was not over then. All the above was only the beginning of the European colonization, it was before the frontier age actually had begun. A total of maybe more than 150 million Indians (of both Americas) were destroyed in the period of 1500 to 1900, as an average two thirds by smallpox and other epidemics, that leaves some 50 million killed directly by violence, bad treatment and slavery. In many countries, such as Brazil, and Guatemala, this continues even today. More Glorious events in US history

Reverend Solomon Stoddard, one of New Englands most esteemed religious leaders, in 1703 formally proposed to the Massachusetts Governor that the colonists be given the financial wherewithal to purchase and train large packs of dogs to hunt Indians as they do bears. [SH241] Massacre of Sand Creek, Colorado 11/29/1864. Colonel John Chivington, a former Methodist minister and still elder in the church (I long to be wading in gore) had a Cheyenne village of about 600, mostly women and children, gunned down despite the chiefs waving with a white flag: 400-500 killed. From an eye-witness account: There were some thirty or forty squaws collected in a hole for protection; they sent out a little girl about six years old with a white flag on a stick; she had not proceeded but a few steps when she was shot and killed. All the squaws in that hole were afterwards killed [SH131] More gory details. By the 1860s, in Hawaii the Reverend Rufus Anderson surveyed the carnage that by then had reduced those islands native population by 90 percent or more, and he declined to see it as tragedy; the expected total die-off of the Hawaiian population was only natural, this missionary said, somewhat equivalent to the amputation of diseased members of the body. [SH244]

20th Century Church Atrocities Catholic extermination camps Surpisingly few know that Nazi extermination camps in World War II were by no means the only ones in Europe at the time. In the years 1942-1943 also in Croatia existed numerous extermination camps, run by Catholic Ustasha under their dictator Ante Paveli, a practising Catholic and regular visitor to the then pope. There were even concentration camps exclusively for children!

In these camps the most notorious was Jasenovac, headed by a Franciscan friar orthodox-Christian serbians (and a substantial number of Jews) were murdered. Like the Nazis the Catholic Ustasha burned their victims in kilns, alive (the Nazis were decent enough to have their victims gassed first). But most of the victims were simply stabbed, slain or shot to death, the number of them being estimated between 300,000 and 600,000, in a rather tiny country. Many of the killers were Franciscan friars. The atrocities were appalling enough to induce bystanders of the Nazi Sicherheitsdient der SS, watching, to complain about them to Hitler (who did not listen). The pope knew about these events and did nothing to prevent them. [MV] Catholic terror in Vietnam In 1954 Vietnamese freedom fighters the Viet Minh had finally defeated the French colonial government in North Vietnam, which by then had been supported by U.S. funds amounting to more than $2 billion. Although the victorious assured religious freedom to all (most non-buddhist Vietnamese were Catholics), due to huge anticommunist propaganda campaigns many Catholics fled to the South. With the help of Catholic lobbies in Washington and Cardinal Spellman, the Vaticans spokesman in U.S. politics, who later on would call the U.S. forces in Vietnam Soldiers of Christ, a scheme was concocted to prevent democratic elections which could have brought the communist Viet Minh to power in the South as well, and the fanatic Catholic Ngo Dinh Diem was made president of South Vietnam. [MW16ff]

Diem saw to it that U.S. aid, food, technical and general assistance was given to Catholics alone, Buddhist individuals and villages were ignored or had to pay for the food aids which were given to Catholics for free. The only religious denomination to be supported was Roman Catholicism.

The Vietnamese McCarthyism turned even more vicious than its American counterpart. By 1956 Diem promulgated a presidential order which read: Individuals considered dangerous to the national defense and common security may be confined by executive order, to a concentration camp. Supposedly to fight communism, thousands of buddhist protesters and monks were imprisoned in detention camps. Out of protest dozens of buddhist teachers male and female and monks poured gasoline over themselves and burned themselves. (Note that Buddhists burned themselves: in comparison Christians tend to burn others). Meanwhile some of the prison camps, which in the meantime were filled with Protestant and even Catholic protesters as well, had turned into no-nonsense death camps. It is estimated that during this period of terror (1955-1960) at least 24,000 were wounded mostly in street riots 80,000 people were executed, 275,000 had been detained or tortured, and about 500,000 were sent to concentration or detention camps. [MW76-89].

To support this kind of government in the next decade thousands of American GIs lost their life.

Rwanda Massacres In 1994 in the small african country of Rwanda in just a few months several hundred thousand civilians were butchered, apparently a conflict of the Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups. For quite some time I heard only rumours about Catholic clergy actively involved in the 1994 Rwanda massacres. Odd denials of involvement were printed in Catholic church journals, before even anybody had openly accused members of the church.

Then, 10/10/96, in the newscast of S2 Aktuell, Germany a station not at all critical to Christianity the following was stated:

Anglican as well as Catholic priests and nuns are suspect of having actively participated in murders. Especially the conduct of a certain Catholic priest has been occupying the public mind in Rwandas capital Kigali for months. He was minister of the church of the Holy Family and allegedly murdered Tutsis in the most brutal manner. He is reported to have accompanied marauding Hutu militia with a gun in his cowl. In fact there has been a bloody slaughter of Tutsis seeking shelter in his parish. Even two years after the massacres many Catholics refuse to set foot on the threshold of their church, because to them the participation of a certain part of the clergy in the slaughter is well established. There is almost no church in Rwanda that has not seen refugees women, children, old being brutally butchered facing the crucifix.

According to eyewitnesses clergymen gave away hiding Tutsis and turned them over to the machetes of the Hutu militia.

In connection with these events again and again two Benedictine nuns are mentioned, both of whom have fled into a Belgian monastery in the meantime to avoid prosecution. According to survivors one of them called the Hutu killers and led them to several thousand people who had sought shelter in her monastery. By force the doomed were driven out of the churchyard and were murdered in the presence of the nun right in front of the gate. The other one is also reported to have directly cooperated with the murderers of the Hutu militia. In her case again witnesses report that she watched the slaughtering of people in cold blood and without showing response. She is even accused of having procured some petrol used by the killers to set on fire and burn their victims alive [S2]

As can be seen from these events, to Christianity the Dark Ages never come to an end.

Read the rest here:
The Lucy Film: Transhumanism's False Promise To Become A ...

ETHICS & POLICY

Astronomical Waste: The Opportunity Cost of Delayed Technological Development Suns are illuminating and heating empty rooms, unused energy is being flushed down black holes, and our great common endowment of negentropy is being irreversibly degraded into entropy on a cosmic scale. These are resources that an advanced civilization could have used to create value-structures, such as sentient beings living worthwhile lives... [Utilitas, Vol. 15, No. 3 (2003): 308-314] [translation: Russian] [html] [pdf]

Human Enhancement Original essays by various prominent moral philosophers on the ethics of human enhancement. [Eds. Nick Bostrom & Julian Savulescu (Oxford University Press, 2009)].

Enhancement Ethics: The State of the Debate The introductory chapter from the book (w/ Julian Savulescu): 1-22 [pdf]

TRANSHUMANISM

Transhumanist Values Wonderful ways of being may be located in the "posthuman realm", but we can't reach them. If we enhance ourselves using technology, however, we can go out there and realize these values. This paper sketches a transhumanist axiology. [Ethical Issues for the 21st Century, ed. Frederick Adams, Philosophical Documentation Center Press, 2003; reprinted in Review of Contemporary Philosophy, Vol. 4, May (2005)] [translations: Polish, Portugese] [html] [pdf]

RISK & THE FUTURE

Global Catastrophic Risks Twenty-six leading experts look at the gravest risks facing humanity in the 21st century, including natural catastrophes, nuclear war, terrorism, global warming, biological weapons, totalitarianism, advanced nanotechnology, general artificial intelligence, and social collapse. The book also addresses over-arching issuespolicy responses and methods for predicting and managing catastrophes. Foreword by Lord Martin Rees. [Eds. Nick Bostrom & Milan Cirkovic (Oxford University Press, 2008)]. Introduction chapter free here [pdf]

TECHNOLOGY ISSUES

THE NEW BOOK

"I highly recommend this book."Bill Gates

"terribly important ... groundbreaking" "extraordinary sagacity and clarity, enabling him to combine his wide-ranging knowledge over an impressively broad spectrum of disciplinesengineering, natural sciences, medicine, social sciences and philosophyinto a comprehensible whole" "If this book gets the reception that it deserves, it may turn out the most important alarm bell since Rachel Carson's Silent Springfrom 1962, or ever."Olle Haggstrom, Professor of Mathematical Statistics

"Nick Bostrom makes a persuasive case that the future impact of AI is perhaps the most important issue the human race has ever faced. Instead of passively drifting, we need to steer a course. Superintelligence charts the submerged rocks of the future with unprecedented detail. It marks the beginning of a new era."Stuart Russell, Professor of Computer Science, University of California, Berkley

"Those disposed to dismiss an 'AI takeover' as science fiction may think again after reading this original and well-argued book." Martin Rees, Past President, Royal Society

"a magnificent conception ... it ought to be required reading on all philosophy undergraduate courses, by anyone attempting to build AIs and by physicists who think there is no point to philosophy." Brian Clegg, Popular Science

"There is no doubting the force of [Bostrom's] arguments...the problem is a research challenge worthy of the next generation's best mathematical talent. Human civilisation is at stake." Financial Times

"This superb analysis by one of the world's clearest thinkers tackles one of humanity's greatest challenges: if future superhuman artificial intelligence becomes the biggest event in human history, then how can we ensure that it doesn't become the last?" Professor Max Tegmark, MIT

"a damn hard read" The Telegraph

ANTHROPICS & PROBABILITY

Cars In the Other Lane Really Do Go Faster When driving on the motorway, have you ever wondered about (and cursed!) the fact that cars in the other lane seem to be getting ahead faster than you? One might be tempted to account for this by invoking Murphy's Law ("If anything can go wrong, it will", discovered by Edward A. Murphy, Jr, in 1949). But there is an alternative explanation, based on observational selection effects... [PLUS, No. 17 (2001)]

PHILOSOPHY OF MIND

DECISION THEORY

BIO

Bostrom has a background in physics, computational neuroscience, and mathematical logic as well as philosophy. He is the author of some 200 publications, including Anthropic Bias (Routledge, 2002), Global Catastrophic Risks (ed., OUP, 2008), Human Enhancement (ed., OUP, 2009), and the academic book Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (OUP, 2014), which became a New York Times bestseller. He is best known for his work in five areas: (i) existential risk; (ii) the simulation argument; (iii) anthropics (developing the first mathematically explicit theory of observation selection effects); (iv) impacts of future technology; and (v) implications of consequentialism for global strategy.

He is recipient of a Eugene R. Gannon Award (one person selected annually worldwide from the fields of philosophy, mathematics, the arts and other humanities, and the natural sciences). He has been listed on Foreign Policy's Top 100 Global Thinkers list; and he was included on Prospect magazines World Thinkers list, the youngest person in the top 15 from all fields and the highest-ranked analytic philosopher. His writings have been translated into 24 languages. There have been more than 100 translations and reprints of his works.

BACKGROUND

I was born in Helsingborg, Sweden, and grew up by the seashore. I was bored in school. At age fifteen or sixteen I had an intellectual awakening, and feeling that I had wasted the first one and a half decades of my life, I resolved to focus on what was important. Since I did not know what was important, and I did not know how to find out, I decided to start by trying to place myself in a better position to find out. So I began a project of intellectual self-development, which I pursued with great intensity for the next one and a half decades.

As an undergraduate, I studied many subjects in parallel, and I gather that my performance set a national record. I was once expelled for studying too much, after the head of Ume University psychology department discovered that I was concurrently following several other full-time programs of study (physics, philosophy, and mathematical logic), which he believed to be psychologically impossible.

For my postgraduate work, I went to London, where I studied physics and neuroscience at King's College, and obtained a PhD from the London School of Economics. For a while I did a little bit stand-up comedy on the vibrant London pub and theatre circuit.

During those years, I co-founded, with David Pearce, the World Transhumanist Association, a nonprofit grassroots organization. Later, I was involved in founding the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, a nonprofit virtual think tank. The objective was to stimulate wider discussion about the implications of future technologies, in particular technologies that might lead to human enhancement. (These organizations have since developed on their own trajectories, and it is very much not the case that I agree with everything said by those who flock under the transhumanist flag.)

Since 2006, I've been the founding director of the Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University. This unique multidisciplinary research aims to enable a select set of intellects to apply careful thinking to big-picture question for humanity and global priorities. The Institute belongs to the Faculty of Philosophy and the Oxford Martin School. Since 2011, I also direct the Programme on the Impacts of Future Technology.

I am in a very fortunate position. I have no teaching duties. I am supported by a staff of assistants and brilliant research fellows. There are virtually no restrictions on what I can work on. I must try very hard to be worthy of this privilege and to cast some light on matters that matter.

CONTACT

For administrative matters, scheduling, and invitations, please contact my assistant, Lamprini Repouliou:

Email: fhiadmin[atsign]philosophy[dot]ox[dot]ac[dot]uk Phone: +44 (0)1865 286800

If you need to contact me directly (I regret I am unable to respond to all emails): nick[atsign]nickbostrom[dot]com.

VIRTUAL ESTATE

http://www.fhi.ox.ac.ukFuture of Humanity Institute

http://www.anthropic-principle.comPapers on observational selection effects

http://www.simulation-argument.comDevoted to the question, "Are you living in a computer simulation?"

http://www.existential-risk.orgHuman extinction scenarios and related concerns

On the bank at the end Of what was there before us Gazing over to the other side On what we can become Veiled in the mist of nave speculation We are busy here preparing Rafts to carry us across Before the light goes out leaving us In the eternal night of could-have-been

CRUCIAL CONSIDERATIONS

A thread that runs through my work is a concern with "crucial considerations". A crucial consideration is an idea or argument that might plausibly reveal the need for not just some minor course adjustment in our practical endeavours but a major change of direction or priority.

If we have overlooked even just one such consideration, then all our best efforts might be for naughtor less. When headed the wrong way, the last thing needed is progress. It is therefore important to pursue such lines of inquiry as might disclose an unnoticed crucial consideration.

Some of the relevant inquiries are about moral philosophy and values. Others have to do with rationality and reasoning under uncertainty. Still others pertain to specific issues and possibilities, such as existential risks, the simulation hypothesis, human enhancement, infinite utilities, anthropic reasoning, information hazards, the future of machine intelligence, or the singularity hypothesis.

High-leverage questions associated with crucial considerations deserve to be investigated. My research interests are quite wide-ranging; yet they all stem from the quest to understand the big picture for humanity, so that we can more wisely choose what to aim for and what to do. Embarking on this quest has seemed the best way to try to make a positive contribution to the world.

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This week, I want to touch on a couple of topics that didnt make the cut in AGE OF DECEIT 2: Alchemy and the Rise of the Beast Image but are nonetheless extremely important.Today I want to tackle Androgyny and the Antichrist.

The Merriam-Webster defines Androgynous as quote:

1. having the characteristics or nature of both male and female

2. neither specifically feminine nor masculine

3. having traditional male and female roles obscured or reversed. [1]

Many occult traditions posses an obscure and twisted interpretation of the Biblical accounts of creation and cosmology. The various threads of alchemical cosmologies fall right in line, in particular regarding the creation of Adam and Eve. Here is how the late Bill Cooper, conspiracy theorist and author ofBehold a Pale Horse, described the alchemical traditions of the creation process and the occult worldview that prevails the elite initiates.

Those who have studied the writings of the ancient alchemist have always been much mystified by what is said about the Philosophers Stone, and the process of transmuting the base metals into gold. These claims have naturally given rise to great deal of grand speculation. And as we are standing within the threshold of a new age, when this precious jewel with all of its power will be evolved and possessed by a considerable number of people, we feel that it is important to divest the subject of all the mysteries that surrounds it and speak in plain terms concerning the matter.

We are taught that in the beginning, God created heaven and earth. The whole universe in fact. And we understand that this great creative force, expresses itself either as will or imagination. By imagination, the great architect of the universe, must first have visualized everything as it was first created and then by his will, the physical atoms were marshaled into this matrix of thought. Thus, gradually bringing this universe into manifestation, as designed by its creator. Nor is it this process complete, but will continue until the whole has become perfect, as originally designed.

The divine hierarchies that have carried out the plan of the great creator also use the same dual creative force when fashioning the crystal and the mineral, the leaf of the plant, or the shape of the animal. Man, the spirit has a like creative power, and has through ages under the guidance of gods, plural, learned to build bodies of increasing value as instruments for his expression. But his pilgrimage through matter was undertaken for the purpose of making him an independent creative intelligence and to attain that end, it was necessary that he should, at the proper time, be emancipated from the guardianship of the gods, so that he might learn to create, not only for himself, but also to aid and to teach others in the great school of life.

During the course of his evolution, man has become more and more enlightened concerning the mystery of life, but nevertheless, it is only a few hundred years ago when life and liberty were endangered by the expression of opinions in advance of the commonly accepted views. It was for this reason, that the alchemist, who had studied more deeply than the majority, were forced to embody their teaching in highly allegorical and symbolical language. Their teaching concerning the spiritual evolution of man and their use of the terms salt, sulfur, mercury, and azoth, so mystifying to the masses, were nevertheless, rooted in cosmic truths, highly illuminating to the initiate. The students of the Rosicrucian teachings who had learned how the world came into being and the process of gradual creation should have no difficulty in properly understanding every part of the alchemist language.

We know in the first place, that there was a time when man in the making was a hermaphrodite, male-female, and able to create from himself. And we remember also, that at that time he was like the plant in other respects. His consciousness was like that which we posses in dreamless sleep, and which was possessed by the plant. The vital energy which he absorbed into his body was used solely for the purpose of growing until the time of propagation came, when a new budding body was cast off to grow also. For the emancipation of humanity from this negative condition, one half of the creative force was turned upward under the direction of the angels for the purpose of building a larynx and a brain, that man might learn to create by thought as do the divine hierarchies and express the creative thought and words. Thus, man ceased to be a physically hermaphrodite and became uni-sexual. He could no longer create from himself physically, nor psychically, as do the Elohim, the male-female hierarchies, in his image who were originally made. And so he occupies in the present time, an unenviable, intermediate position between the plant and the god. At the time one half of the human sex force was diverted for the purpose of building the brain, men were helpless and lacking in knowledge of how to overcome conditions and had no outside help, and given the race, must have died out. Therefore angels from the moon, who were guardians of mankind, herded the sexes together in great temples at times when the interplanetary lines of force were propitious to propagation, and thus they perpetuated the race. It was also proposed that when the brain had been completed, the Lords of Mercury, elder brothers of our present humanity, who excelled in intelligence should teach us how to use the mind and to make it truly creative. Thus by the work of these two great hierarchies, we were raised from unconsciousness to the first stage of creative intelligence; from plant to god. [2]

Now I would like to clarify that these are not Bill Coopers beliefs. He was merely speaking from the perspective of the modern alchemist and occultist. What should be obvious to anyone who has studied the occult in any measure, is that the story always reflects the Luciferian Doctrine; that is to say, Satan was responsible for freeing mankind from the clutches of the evil god Yahweh and his prison, the Garden of Eden. The alchemical account is simply more elegant and detailed yet still retains many interesting attributes from angels, Elohim, and hierarchies from Mercury and the Moon. But for this post, my focus is on the idea that humanity prior to our current state was a hermaphrodite, male-female, and how that perspective fuels the modern transhumanist movement, and furthermore, shapes the potential identity of the Antichrist.

We have seen a steady and healthy attack on the traditional family in the last century. While issues within the traditional or even better, the Biblical sense of family has always been at stake, it seems modern culture and society have ramped up in contemporary America, first with the womens rights movement, and now with the cultural support of homosexuality. Let me be very clear here that I dont think womens rights is necessarily evil or satanic. However, I do think it was a huge chink in the armor when it came to the traditional sense of family. Like any view, extremism is harmful and destructive, but even women I know, such as my wife, believe that the rise in divorce, and the decline of masculinity in America has a direct correlation with the over-empowerment of women in society and the advent of freedom of choice. But a second leg to this attack is homosexuality.

I have friends who are homosexual and consider themselves transgender, and I sincerely love them as fellow image bearers of God. Please understand that my opinions and comments here on homosexuality are at the cultural and societal level and not an attack on any individual. But it is true that the rise in homosexuality, or at least the acceptance of it, has been a huge detriment on the traditional family model. And before I get thumping on the Bible, lets look at this from a very practical, natural sense. Society and the human race is built on the function of the male and female mating and producing children. If the cycle stops, the human race goes extinct. With this in mind, one can claim that homosexuality is unnatural from the naturalist perspective. But because of our broken society, gay couples have had the opportunity to raise foster children, or even better, with the advent of technology, have had the capacity to create their own progeny with the help of test tubes. And while the topic of homosexuality is highly debated, especially amongst the religious and anti-religious camps, my goal here it to tie this all back to alchemy and the mystical traditions that stem back from antiquity.

Given these cultural breakdowns in the gender line, its no surprise to mention that androgyny is nothing new for someone like myself who was born on the dawn of the generation labelled Millennials. The music and entertainment industry has been notorious for blurring the lines between gender for decades. Michael Jackson, Bret Michaels, David Bowie, Adam Lambert, Boy George, Marylin Manson, just to name a few, are male musicians who all had their image bear the resemblance of being in touch with their feminine side. Then you have Lady Gaga, Grace Jones, Annie Lennox, Patti Smith, and K.D. Lang just to name a few female rock stars who resembled a more masculine look. So given the climate regarding gender ambiguity, where are we headed, especially in light of transhumanism?

There are at least three reasons to suspect that gender is on its way out.

Firstly, the trend towards increasing insistence on choosing the socially-constructed aspects of ones genderwhether it concerns sexual orientation, how to dress, what kind of roles to play in society, how we refer to ourselves (and insist on being referred to by others, or whateverseems set to continue, at least in the developed world.

Secondly, surgical techniques enabling de facto alteration of our biological gender, at least at the macroscopic level, are becoming increasingly sophisticated and are thus enabling increasing alignment of our (apparent) biological gender with our wishes.

Thirdly, and most radically, we may be on the verge of being able to tinker massively with our DNA, with the result that even at the genetic level we might find ourselves able to blur the boundaries between male (XY) and female (XX), to a far greater extent than nature has done for us.

And once gender becomes a matter of choice, rather than of natures providence, there is no reason why there should be only two, three or even four of them. And once gender splinters, like political parties and religious denominations, into categories that are limited only by the human imagination, the term gender seems likely to become increasingly inappropriate as a description of reality. [3]

Can you imagine a society where gender is simply a choice? Anything goes! With the scientific and technological power that is behind transhumanism, such a world is right around the corner. And that means your children, and their children will be facing a culture and a society who champions freedom of choice which will enable them to choose their gender, should they decide to practice their freedoms. Whats even more alarming is that the alchemical translation of the creation of Adam and Eve will most certainly be used as a way to justify these choices as something the church at large can accept. Heres the logic. They will bring up Genesis 1:27

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

The traditional interpretation is that God created man, or humanity, in His image and that the humanity He created was male and female. But the alchemical interpretation sees this as avid proof that Adam was androgynous. This brings up many fascinating theological questions and points of discussion such as Will there be gender in heaven? or Is God androgynous? Such a questions deserve its own posts, but for now, I simply want to show that with good demonic logic, one can twist the Biblical account to promote an androgynous origin to humanity.

Certainly after seeing the potential direction of gender given transhumanism, the thought of the Antichrist being androgynous is not at all crazy. But the main question would be, Is there Biblical support for this statement? and the quick answer is yes. Daniel 11:37 is the verse that raises the possibility of the Antichrist being androgynous.

Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all.

For the traditional prophecy scholar, it might seem absurd to picture a gender-bender Antichrist figure who would captivate the world so much that he would bring false peace to Israel by warring the neighboring nations with the people screaming, Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him? (Revelation 13:4). But given this passage, the possibility exists. We know that the Antichrist will compare himself to all other gods, and God Himself claiming to be above them all (Isaiah 14). So in essence, his own worship of himself, or herself, will be greater than anything else. And while the reality of the Antichrist being androgynous is in some aspects trivial and irrelevant to the overall fulfillment of Bible Prophecy, thinking about this also made me ponder a couple of other possibilities.

First, if the Great Deception that LA Marzulli and others always talk about is true, then the Antichrist might be a Nephilim, or perhaps present him/herself as the Alien Savior. If that scenario were to play out, then androgyny would make perfect sense because this alien being would not be identified by gender, as we fallen humanity are cursed with, but to us would be to us a god; a spiritually evolved being who would confirm all the traditions of the ancient mysteries.

The second possibility, given the work of author Peter Goodgame and his writings The Giza Discovery, would be that the Antichrist will be the Nimrod figure that we read about in Genesis 10. The potential connection I want to highlight here is that one of the gods worshiped in ancient Egypt is Akhenaton, whom is pictured in todays blog image. This figure was touted as a male, but represented with wide hips like a female making his gender ambiguous. There are other Egyptians gods such as Thoth whose gender was also undefined. But the point is, if the rendering of Revelation 13:3 and Revelation 17:10 are correct by Mr. Goodgame, then perhaps the Antichrist will be the resurrection of an ancient Egyptian god, perhaps Akhenaton, or another figure whose gender is ambiguous.

These ideas obviously deserve a far deeper study, but for todays post, I simply wanted to highlight the Trials of Transhumanism and in particular the topic of Androgyny and the Antichrist. I hope you were able to pick up on the severity and urgency of the times we are living in given the circumstances we face. I believe it is important to discuss these issues and raise awareness regarding them, because not only might it help someone experiencing an identity crisis concerning their gender, but more importantly, we can save souls.

I want to end today with this passage spoken by Jesus that I have read and mentioned many times regarding these end times, but nevertheless, gives me chills every time.

Sources

[1] http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/androgynous

[2] Bill Cooper, Hour of the Time: Episode 733: Spiritual Alchemy, November 2, 1995

[3] http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/wicks20120315

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About the author: Im a Christian media producer focused on making thought provoking and informative content. I love to study various issues relating to Bible Prophecy and the current world climate. My goal is to learn by teaching and to create a community of informed truth seekers, and to be salt and light in this often confusing world that we live in.

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The Trials of Transhumanism: Androgyny and the Antichrist

Did you know that the word transhuman literally means beyond human?

All over the world, scientists and intellectuals are joining the transhumanism movement. Those that adhere to this philosophy believe that the time has come for us to use technology to take control of our own evolution. By doing so, they believe that we can give ourselves superhuman powers and radically extend our lifespans. Right now, the most popular movie in America is Avengers: Age of Ultron, and in recent years we have watched films about mutants and superheroes become some of Hollywoods biggest moneymakers. But transhumanists believe that we will soon be able to literally turn ourselves into such superheroes as technology continues to increase at an exponential rate. And once we have superhuman powers and superhuman intelligence, they are convinced that we will eradicate all sickness, disease, poverty and war. Many of them actually believe that we will be able to achieve immortality and establish a utopia on Earth just a few decades from now. In other words, we wont need a God because we will have become our own gods.

At the core of the transhumanist movement is an unshakable faith in the inevitable technological progress of humanity. Yes, there are some transhumanists that have doubts, but for most transhumanists the solution to all of our problems is more technology. If you are not familiar with transhumanism, the following is a really good definitionthat I recently came across

Transhumanism is a cultural and intellectual movement promoting the aim of transforming the human condition fundamentally by developing and making available technologies to enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capabilities. Transhumanist thinking studies the potential benefits and hazards of emerging technologies that could overcome basic human limitations. It also addresses ethical matters involved in developing and using such technologies. Some transhumanists predict that human beings may eventually transform themselves into beings with such greatly expanded abilities that they justify a state of being known as posthuman.

Transhumanists want to help humans live much longer, and they also want to dramatically increase the quality of those lives. Ultimately, most transhumanists are fully convinced that they will be able to defeat death altogether. The following is a short excerptfrom an ExtremeTech article

One of the core concepts in transhumanist thinking is life extension: Through genetic engineering, nanotech, cloning, and other emerging technologies, eternal life may soon be possible. Likewise, transhumanists are interested in the ever-increasing number of technologies that can boost our physical, intellectual, and psychological capabilities beyond what humans are naturally capable of (thus the termtranshuman). Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), for example, which speeds up reaction times and learning speed byrunning a very weak electric current through your brain, has already been used by the US military to train snipers. On the more extreme side, transhumanism deals with the concepts of mind uploading (to a computer), and what happens when we finally craft a computer with greater-than-human intelligence (the technological singularity).

So would you like to live forever armed with superhuman powers?

The most famous transhumanist in the world, Ray Kurzweil, actually believes that he is going to be able to do that. But first he has to stay alive long enough for the technologies that he believes are coming to be developed. So Kurzweiltakes 150 supplements a day in an attempt to keep his body in peak condition

The youthful 65-year-old currently takes 150 supplements a day, which he argues is the first bridge.

The idea is to build enough bridges to ensure the body holds out long enough for life-lengthening technology to come into its own.

He has likened the biology of the body to computer software and believes we are all out of date.

Kurzweil is absolutely convinced that if he can just stretch his life out long enough that technologies that will enable him to achieve immortality are right around the corner. In fact,in a piece that he wrote for CNN he expressed his belief that our medical technologies will be a million times more powerful than they are today just two decades from now

Health and medicine is now an information technology and is therefore subject to what I call the law of accelerating returns, which is a doubling of capability (for the same cost) about each year that applies to any information technology.

As a result, technologies to reprogram the software that underlie human biology are already a thousand times more powerful than they were when the genome project was completed in 2003, and will again be a thousand times more powerful than they are today in a decade, and a million times more powerful in two decades.

So will he be right?

We will just have to wait and see.

For a long time, many in the transhumanist movement (including Kurzweil) have been pointing to a time period between 2030 and 2050 during which they believe something remarkable will happen. They believe that during that time period something known as the singularity will occur. As technology increases at an exponential rate, they believe that artificial intelligence will begin to greatly surpass human intelligence at some point, and that humanity will merge with this new super intelligence. Once that happens, they believe that the world will change in ways that we cannot even comprehend today

Kurzweil and his followers believe that a crucial turning point will be reached around the year 2030, when information technology achieves genuine intelligence, at the same time as biotechnology enables a seamless union between us and this super-smart new technological environment. Ultimately the human-machine mind will become free to roam a universe of its own creation, uploading itself at will on to a suitably powerful computational substrate. We will become essentially god-like in our powers.

Does that sound good to you, or does it sound frightening?

Other transhumanists are not quite as optimistic as Kurzweil and his followers. Just consider what Max Tegmark, the author of Our Mathematical Universe: My Quest for the Ultimate Nature of Reality, had to say about what life will be like after the singularity

After this, life on Earth would never be the same. Whoever or whatever controls this technology would rapidly become the worlds wealthiest and most powerful, outsmarting allfinancial markets, out-inventing and out-patenting all human researchers, and out-manipulating all human leaders. Even if we humansnominally merge with such machines, we might have no guarantees whatsoever about the ultimate outcome, making it feel less like a mergerand more like a hostile corporate takeover.

Even some of the most prominent scientists in the world are skeptical of what an ultra-powerful artificial intelligence would mean for the future of humanity. The following is an excerpt from an article co-authored by Stephen Hawking

Looking further ahead, there are no fundamental limits to what can be achieved: there is no physical law precluding particles from being organized in ways that perform even more advanced computations than the arrangements of particles in human brains. An explosive transition is possible, although it may play out differently than in the movie: as Irving Good realized in 1965, machines with superhuman intelligence could repeatedly improve their design even further, triggering what Vernor Vinge called a singularity and Johnny Depps movie character calls transcendence. One can imagine such technology outsmarting financial markets, out-inventing human researchers, out-manipulating human leaders, and developing weapons we cannot even understand. Whereas the short-term impact of AI depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.

But despite these reservations from many in the scientific community, many transhumanists are pushing ahead as hard as they can. Many of them are absolutely convinced that what they are doing will bring a new golden age to this planet. Just consider the words oftranshumanist Zoltan Istvan

Despite this, people continue to worry that technology and science that make our species more transhuman will be used to create a deeper divide in society for the haves and have-nots. Those worries are unfounded. A close examination of the issues show that transhumanist technology and science liberates us, brings us better health, and has improved the living standards of all people around the world. If you value liberty, equality and progress, it makes sense to embrace the coming age of transhumanism.

Doesnt that sound wonderful?

And there are even some transhumanists that couch their hopes and dreams for the future in religious terminology. For example, transhumanist Mark Pesce is fully convinced that transhumanism will allow ordinary humans to become as gods

Men die, planets die, even stars die. We know all this. Because we know it, we seek something morea transcendence of transience, translation to incorruptible form. An escape if you will, a stop to the wheel. We seek, therefore, to bless ourselves with perfect knowledge and perfect will; To become as gods, take the universe in hand, and transform it in our imagefor our own delight. As it is on Earth, so it shall be in the heavens. The inevitable result of incredible improbability, the arrow of evolution is lipping us into the transhuman an apotheosis to reason, salvation attained by good works.

That is some pretty strong stuff.

So what do you think about all of this? Please feel free to join the discussion by leaving a comment below

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Transhumanism: An Attempt To Use Technology To ... - Infowars

http://whatistranshumanism.org

Transhumanism is a way of thinking about the future that is based on the premise that the human species in its current form does not represent the end of our development but rather a comparatively early phase.

Transhumanism is a loosely defined movement that has developed gradually over the past two decades.

Transhumanism is a class of philosophies of life that seek the continuation and acceleration of the evolution of intelligent life beyond its currently human form and human limitations by means of science and technology, guided by life-promoting principles and values.

Humanity+ formally defines it based on Max Mores original definition as follows:

Transhumanism can be viewed as an extension of humanism, from which it is partially derived. Humanists believe that humans matter, that individuals matter. We might not be perfect, but we can make things better by promoting rational thinking, freedom, tolerance, democracy, and concern for our fellow human beings. Transhumanists agree with this but also emphasize what we have the potential to become. Just as we use rational means to improve the human condition and the external world, we can also use such means to improve ourselves, the human organism. In doing so, we are not limited to traditional humanistic methods, such as education and cultural development. We can also use technological means that will eventually enable us to move beyond what some would think of as human.

The Transhumanist FAQ was developed in 1998 and authored into a formal FAQ in 1999 through the inspirational work of transhumanists, including Alexander Chislenko, Max More, Anders Sandberg, Natasha Vita-More, James Hughes, and Nick Bostrom. Several people contributed to the definition of transhumanism, which was originated by Max More. Greg Burch, David Pearce, Kathryn Aegis, and Anders Sandberg kindly offered extensive editorial comments. The presentation in the cryonics section was, and still is, directly inspired by an article by Ralph Merkle. Ideas, criticisms, questions, phrases, and sentences to the original version were contributed by (in alphabetical order): Kathryn Aegis, Alex (intech@intsar.com), Brent Allsop, Brian Atkins, Scott Badger, Doug Bailey, Harmony Baldwin, Damien Broderick, Greg Burch, David Cary, John K Clark, Dan Clemensen, Damon Davis, Jeff Dee, Jean-Michel Delhotel, Dylan Evans, EvMick@aol.com, Daniel Fabulich, Frank Forman, Robin Hanson, Andrew Hennessey, Tony Hollick, Joe Jenkins, William John, Michelle Jones, Arjen Kamphius, Henri Kluytmans, Eugene Leitl, Michael Lorrey, mark@unicorn.com, Peter C. McCluskey, Erik Moeller, J. R. Molloy, Max More, Bryan Moss, Harvey Newstrom, Michael Nielsen, John S. Novak III, Dalibor van den Otter, David Pearce, pilgrim@cyberdude.com, Thom Quinn, Anders Sandberg, Wesley R. Schwein, Shakehip@aol.com, Allen Smith, Geoff Smith, Randy Smith, Dennis Stevens, Derek Strong, Remi Sussan, Natasha Vita-More, Michael Wiik, Eliezer Yudkowsky, and zebo@pro-ns.net

Over the years, this FAQ has been updated to provide a substantial account of transhumanism. Extropy Institute (ExI) was a source of information for the first version of the Transhumanist FAQ, version 1.0 in the 1990s. WTA adopted the FAQ in 2001 and Nick Bostrom and James Hughes continued to work on it, with the contributions of close to hundred people from ExI and WTA, including Aleph and Transcedo and the UK Transhumanist Association. New material has been added and many old sections have been substantially reworked. In the preparation of version 2.0, the following people have been especially helpful: Eliezer Yudkowsky, who provided editorial assistance with comments on particular issues of substance; Dale Carrico who proofread the first half of the text; and Michael LaTorra who did the same for the second half; and Reason who then went over the whole document again, as did Frank Forman, and Sarah Banks Forman. Useful comments of either substance or form have also been contributed by (in alphabetical order): Michael Anissimov, Samantha Atkins, Milan Cirkovic, Jos Luis Cordeiro, George Dvorsky, James Hughes, G.E. Jordan, Vasso Kambourelli, Michael LaTorra, Eugen Leitl, Juan Meridalva, Harvey Newstrom, Emlyn OReagan, Christine Peterson, Giulio Prisco, Reason, Rafal Smigrodzki, Simon Smith, Mike Treder, and Mark Walker. Many others have over the years offered questions or reflections that have in some way helped shape this document, and even though it is not possible to name you all, your contributions are warmly appreciated.

The Transhumanist FAQ 3.0, as revised by the continued efforts of many transhumanists, will continue to be updated and modified as we develop new knowledge and better ways of accounting for old knowledge which directly and indirectly relate to transhumanism. Our goal is to provide a reliable source of information about transhumanism.

Thank you to all who have contributed in the past and to those who offer new insights to this FAQ!

See the original post:
What is Transhumanism?