You Tube Theology

Parallel paper presented during the Heythrop Summer Conference: 'Let Him Easter in Us', Thursday 5th July 2018

"We envision the possibility of broadening human potential by overcoming ageing, cognitive shortcomings, involuntary suffering and our confinement to Earth." This is one of the first lines of the Transhumanist Declaration. Among the Transhumanists are some serious academics and one of Google's most inventive scientists, Ray Kurzweil, who invented speech recognition. The latter believes that humans and AI (artificial intelligence) will merge. Sir Martin Rees, formerly President of the Royal Society, likewise speaks of merging with computers. While the transhumanists hope for life unending on Earth, some of them fear that AI will take over and may destroy humanity. Oxford Professor Nick Bostrom is one of them. More outlandish, Kurzweil believes that we can turn ourselves into non-biological entities. Basically, he believes we can transfer our minds to computers. His is a reductionist ontology. He identifies personhood with consciousness. He reduces thinking to information that can be fed into a computer. He forgets that we are body and mind. He is not alone in thinking on these lines.

Transhumanists rightly fear that AI can become dangerous. It can. Because, it can be put to dangerous use such as destructive weapons. Also true, we may prolong human lifespan. But eternal life is not of this world. Transhumanism is an atheistic 'creed'. And thinking such as that of Kurzweil is based on false understanding of personhood.