Transhumanism in fiction

Many of the tropes of science fiction can be viewed as similar to the goals of transhumanism. Science fiction literature contains many positive depictions of technologically enhanced human life, occasionally set in utopian (especially techno-utopian) societies. However, science fiction's depictions of technologically enhanced humans or other posthuman beings frequently come with a cautionary twist. The more pessimistic scenarios include many dystopian tales of human bioengineering gone wrong.

Examples of "transhumanist fiction" include novels by Linda Nagata, Greg Egan, Zoltan Istvan, and Hannu Rajaniemi. Transhuman novels are often philosophical in nature, exploring the impact such technologies might have on human life. Nagata's novels, for example, explore the relationship between the natural and artificial, and suggest that while transhuman modifications of nature may be beneficial, they may also be hazardous, so should not be lightly undertaken.^[1] Egan's Diaspora explores the nature of ideas such as reproduction and questions if they make sense in a post-human context. Istvan's novel The Transhumanist Wager explores how far one person would go to achieve an indefinite lifespan via science and technology.^[2] Rajaniemi's novel, while more action oriented, still explores themes such as death and finitude in post-human life.

Fictional depictions of transhumanist scenarios are also seen in other media, such as movies (Transcendence), television series (the Ancients of Stargate SG-1), manga and anime (Ghost in the Shell), role-playing games (Rifts and Eclipse Phase) and video games (Deus Ex or BioShock).

Transhumanist literature

Notable transhumanist authors

• Neal Asher
• Margaret Atwood
• Iain M. Banks
• Stephen Baxter
• Greg Bear
• Gregory Benford
• Marshall Brain
• David Brin
• Ted Chiang
• Arthur C. Clarke
• Philip K. Dick
• Cory Doctorow
• Jacek Dukaj
• Greg Egan
• Warren Ellis
• Peter F Hamilton
• Michel Houellebecq
• Aldous Huxley
• Zoltan Istvan
• Stanisław Lem
• C. S. Lewis
• Richard K. Morgan
• Ramez Naam
• Yuri Nikitin
• Richard Powers
• Adam Renzema
• Alastair Reynolds
• John Scalzi
• Dan Simmons
• David Simpson
• Olaf Stapledon
• Neal Stephenson
• Bruce Sterling
• Charles Stross
• John C. Wright

In television and film

• 2001: A Space Odyssey
• The 4400
• 2B
• Akira
• Alphas
• Andromeda
• Avatar: a film by James Cameron, in which a paralyzed soldier finds new life by transferring his consciousness into an alien body.
• Battlestar Galactica
• Beneath the Planet of the Apes
• Bio Booster Armor Guyver
• Brainstorm
• Chappie
• Crest of the Stars
• Cyborg
• Dark Angel
• Dark City
• District 9
• Doctor Who
• Elysium
• Fringe: a television show about a group of paranormal investigators who regularly deal with transhumans that have used technology to go beyond normal limits.
• Galatea 2.2
• Galaxy Express 999
• Gattaca
• Ghost in the Shell
• Heroes
• H+ (a web series)
• The Lawnmower Man
• Limitless: a film in which a man obtains superhuman intelligence thanks to a nootropic drug.
• Lucy
• The Matrix franchise
• The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
• Mobile Suit Gundam
• Neon Genesis Evangelion
• Ninja Robots
• Orphan Black
• The Outer Limits episodes:
  • "The Sixth Finger", in which an ordinary human is subjected to advanced evolution.
• Pacific Rim
• Powder
• Prometheus
• RoboCop franchise
• Seveneves
• Stargate SG-1
• Episodes of the various Star Trek series:
  • "Where No Man Has Gone Before", from the original series, in which an Enterprise crewmember develops extraordinary powers as a result of leaving the galaxy
  • "Charlie X", another original series episode in which the Enterprise takes on board a young crash survivor who had been taught how to use psychic powers by aliens to stay alive, but lacks the maturity to use them wisely.
  • "Miri", an original series episode in which an Earth-duplicate planet is inhabited by centuries-old children, the only survivors of a life-prolongation project that created a disease fatal when adulthood begins.
  • "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", original series episode in which Federation scientists at a remote research station turn out to have uploaded their minds into android bodies, and create an android duplicate of Kirk.
  • "Space Seed", original series episode where the Enterprise revives a lost group of late 20th-century genetically engineered humans with superior strength, constitution and intelligence.
  • "Metamorphosis", original series episode in which Spock, Kirk and McCoy, transporting a Federation diplomat, crash on a planetoid where they find the long-lost inventor of warp drive, restored to youth and kept alive by a noncorporeal alien, which later merges with the diplomat to save her life.
  • "Spock's Brain", original-series episode in which the titular organ is removed from Spock's body by a race of aliens who need it to power the computer that keeps them alive.
  • "Is There in Truth No Beauty?", original series episode where one character uses an external sensor web to compensate for her hidden blindness.
  • "Plato's Stepchildren", original series episode where the Enterprise visits a planet inhabited by telekinetic humanoids who use their power to bully others, including Kirk and the crew, in accordance with their interpretation of Platonism."
  • "Hide and Q", Next Generation (TNG) episode in which Q gives Commander Riker the same godlike powers he has to see how he would use, or not use, them.
  • "The Nth Degree, TNG episode where Enterprise crewmember Reginald Barclay has his intelligence advanced, and ultimately connects himself to the ship's computer, to make contact with an alien race.
  • "Q Who", "The Best of Both Worlds" and "I, Borg", all episodes of TNG featuring the Borg, a race of cyborgs united in a collective consciousness who assimilate other races.
• Star Wars
• Strange Days
• Terminator Salvation
• Texhnolyze
• Transcendence
• Tron franchise
• Episodes of The X Files
  • "Killswitch" about a sentient artificial intelligence and some people who uploads his consciousness to a computer system^[3]
• Watchmen

In comics or graphic novels

• Battle Angel Alita/Gunm
• The webcomic Dresden Codak stars a transhuman cyborg named Kimiko Ross who augments her body over the course of the strip's stories.
• The comic Transmetropolitan is about a transhuman society several centuries in the future that includes many cyborgs, uploaded humans, and genetically modified mutants.
• The dystopian graphic novels Upgrade and Monkey Room by Louis Rosenberg convey satirical views on the human march towards singularity.

In video games

• BioShock series
• Crysis series
• Deus Ex series
• Halo
• Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
• SOMA
• Cyberpunk 2077
• Call of Duty: Black Ops III

In table-top games

• The role playing game Eclipse Phase takes transhumanism to a post-apocalyptic horror setting in which Seed Artificial Intelligences have gone rogue, introducing itself with the slogan “Your mind is software. Program it. – Your body is a shell. Change it. – Death is a disease. Cure it. – Extinction is approaching. Fight it.”
• The GURPS Supplement Transhuman Space deals with a closer transhumanist future of our solar system, describing a role playing game setting “in the year 2100”.
• Another prominent and long-lived example is the Warhammer 40,000 universe--Games Workshop's longstanding tabletop strategy franchise, which includes several video games and dozens of novels. While usually focusing on concepts like the loss of technology and the death of knowledge, and nowhere near what could be called a "utopia", the Warhammer 40,000 universe does depict a setting where transhumanism and even posthumanism are both quite widespread. Cybernetic and genetic modifications, human-machine interfaces, self-aware computer "spirits" (advanced AIs), ubiquitous space travel and even true posthuman gods are all quite prominent and featured throughout. The main protagonists of many novels and campaigns, the Imperial Space Marines, are literal textbook transhumans: normal human men who have been so vastly augmented and changed by technology that they are no longer Homo sapiens but some other, new species. However unlike many transhuman or posthuman futures depicted by authors on the subject, Warhammer 40,000 is bleak, violent and filled with war and even with the existence of posthuman gods (like the Emperor of Mankind or his Primarchs) humanity is still beset on all sides by threats—including those of actual, supernatural gods, namely the Chaos Gods, the two Orkish deities, Gork and Mork, and their fungal offspring and the C'Tan, the star eating gods who tricked the Necrons into becoming what they are now.

See also

• Biopunk
• Postcyberpunk
• Cyborgs in fiction
• Utopian and dystopian fiction
• Genetic engineering in science fiction
• Superhumans in fiction
• Uplifting in science fiction

References

1. "Review of The Bohr Maker, Tech Heaven and Deception Well by Linda Nagata". Aleph.se. Retrieved 2012-05-09.
2. http://www.kurzweilai.net/book-review-the-transhumanist-wager
3. Kill Switch (The X-Files)

External links

• List of transhumanist books