The Post Human Ideal and Transhumanism

“It is also possible to suppose that mechanical inventions, developed even further and further, may reach a point where they will seem so dangerous that men will feel impelled to renounce them, either from the terror gradually aroused by some of their consequences, or else following on a cataclysm which everyone is at liberty to picture as he pleases.” ‘Intro to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines’ - Guenon

Guenon’s theory that horrifying technological advances could be a catalyst, signifying the high water mark for the cult of progress before the West turns instead to a more Traditionally oriented civilisational mode, is represented in popular science fiction as "reactionary technophobia".

Specifically where post human ideals are represented, we find frequent examples of a mania for the dissolution of the organic human in favour of a new “higher”, mechanised version. While there were many films and novels of this genre (beginning perhaps with Shelley’s Frankenstein 1818) which serve as warnings of the dangers of the post-human or post-organic ideal; The Glass Bees, The Terminator, Demon Seed, Colossus: The Forbin Project, etc. In more recent years the trend is to portray post-humanism in a positive light, with sympathy for the cyborgs, augmented humans and artificial intelligences.

Fritz Lang’s Metropolis 1927, foreshadowed much of what was to come in post-human sci-fi. It was remade as an anime in 2001 Metropolis (2001 film), in which the proletariat revolution against machines was preserved, but combined with a separate reaction from a privately funded “Fascist” organisation called the Marduks. Due to the Shinto religion’s belief that a kami (spirit) can occupy a robot, the sympathy for AI in Japanese cinema is more nuanced than the purely progressive representations in the West.

Another anime, Ghost in the Shell, while generally uncritical of the processes that lead to post-human conditions, is not altogether without merit. That being said the spin off series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex features a typically anti-traditional plot-line in which the cybernetic police must battle an anti-refugee terrorist group named Individual Eleven, whose inspiration, a fictional political theorist named Patrick Sylvester, was based on Yukio Mishima and the essays the group disseminates are based on Mishima's "Kindai Nohgaku Shu (Modern Noh Collection)". However, the depiction of Sylvester is not entirely unsympathetic….

‘If one were to give one’s life as a revolutionary leader, that life would be sublimated into something transcendent. In death, a hero meets his mortal end, but he gains eternity.’ Patrick Sylvester.

Such nuances are entirely absent in modern films such as Lucy (2014), in which a kind of false transcendence is celebrated. The review on Gornahoor puts it perfectly.

“Although Lucy achieves something like the Absolute Self, she is still “other”. Although she provides the world with all knowledge as bits on a flash drive, she does not solve the problem of meaning. What do they do with that knowledge? What does it all mean? Ultimately, nothing.” Cologero –Review of “Lucy” 2014.

The left is determined to undermine all conventional identity structures (nationhood, gender, race etc) in an effort to disorientate the individual, seemingly in preparation for the “new man” a post-human cyborg, entirely dependent on technology of diverse forms. It is therefore pertinent to discuss the subject of post-humanism in popular culture in detail.

This text is taken from a Survive the Jive facebook post from October, 2016.