Significant Contributions Shaping the Evolution of Transhumanist Philosophy

 

History

1308-1321: Dante Alighieri, in the Divine Comedy, utilizes the words “Transumanare,” “Trasumanar,” and “Transumano.” ⁷

1605: Francis Bacon, an English philosopher, statesman, and scientist, writes, “The lengthening of the thread of life itself, and the postponement for a time of that death which gradually steals on by natural dissolution and the decay of age, is a subject of which no physician has handled in proportion to its dignity.” (The Advancement of Learning (Book IV, Chapter II)¹

1773: Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States, a polymath, and a leading figure of the Enlightenment movement writes, “I wish it were possible… to invent a method of embalming drowned persons, in such a manner that they might be recalled to life at any period, however distant; for having a very ardent desire to see and observe the state of America a hundred years hence, I should prefer to an ordinary death, being immersed with a few friends in a cask of Madeira, until that time, then to be recalled to life by the solar warmth of my dear country! But… in all probability, we live in a century too little advanced, and too near the infancy of science, to see such an art brought in our time to its perfection.”  (Letter to Jacques Dubourg, reprinted in  Life Magazine, 9 Jan 1956, page 86) ¹

1780: Benjamin Franklin writes, “The rapid Progress true Science now makes, occasions my Regretting sometimes that I was born so soon. It is impossible to imagine the Height to which may be carried in a 1000 Years the Power of Man over Matter… All Diseases may by sure means be prevented or cured, not excepting even that of Old Age, and our Lives lengthened at pleasure even beyond the antediluvian Standard. O that moral Science were in as fair a Way of Improvement, that Men would cease to be Wolves to one another, and the human Beings would at length learn what they now improperly call Humanity.”  (Letter to Joseph Priestley)¹

1794: Marquis du Condorcet, a French philosopher, mathematician, and political scientist, writes, “It is manifest that the improvement of the practice of medicine, becoming more efficacious in consequence of the progress of reason and the social order, must in the end put a period to transmissible or contagious disorders, as well to those general maladies resulting from climate, aliments, and the nature of certain occupations. Nor would it be difficult to prove that this hope might be extended to almost every other malady, of which it is probable we shall hereafter discover the most remote causes. Would it even be absurd to suppose this quality of melioration in the human species as susceptible of an indefinite advancement; to suppose that a period must one day arrive when death will be nothing more than the effect either of extraordinary accidents, or of the slow and gradual decay of the vital powers; and that the duration of the middle space, of the interval between the birth of man and this decay, will itself have no assignable limit? Certainly man will not become immortal; but may not the distance between the moment in which he draws his first breath, and the common term when, in the course of nature, without malady or accident, he finds it impossible any longer to exist, be necessarily protracted?”  (Future Progress of Man, Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind)¹

1817: Napoleon Bonaparte, a French military and political leader, wrote, “Thousands of years from now man will be quite different from what he is at present. Sciences will be so advanced then that perhaps a way will have been found to prolong life indefinitely.” (Quoted in the book, The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of his Written and Spoken Words) ¹

1850s – 1903: Nikolai Fyodorov, a philosopher, religious thinker, and futurologist, introduces Russian cosmism, a spiritual worldview that became a precursor to transhumanism. This belief system champions the pursuit of immortality, exploration of space, and reviving deceased individuals through scientific means. ³

1923: J. B. S. Haldane, a British scientist and Marxist publishes Daedalus; or, Science and the Future which presents an initial perspective on transhumanism that focuses primarily on the ethical ramifications stemming from scientific progress. ³

1929: John Desmond Bernal, a British scientist publishes The World, the Flesh and the Devil, introducing concepts fundamental to transhumanism, such as the creation of habitable space structures and the potential advancements science may bring to human physicality and intelligence. ³

1931: Neil R. Jones, an author has his short story “The Jameson Satellite,” published in Amazing Stories, revolving around a man whose dead body is sent into orbit and preserved at an extremely low temperature for countless years until a cyborg civilization comes across it. After thawing his brain, they transplant it into a robot’s body. ³

1932: Aldous Huxley, an author, publishes the novel “Brave New World” describing a transhumanist dystopia where mind control, drug use, biotechnology, and casual sex maintain a passive, unchanging caste society. 2

1935: Alexis Carrel, a French surgeon, biologist, and pathologist, “Science, which has transformed the material world, gives man the power of transforming himself. It has unveiled some of the secret mechanisms of his life. It has shown him how to alter their motion, how to mold his body and his soul on patterns born of his wishes. For the first time in history, humanity, helped by science, has become master of its destiny. But will we be capable of using this knowledge of ourselves to our real advantage? To progress again, man must remake himself. And he cannot remake himself without suffering. For he is both the marble and the sculptor. In order to uncover his true visage he must shatter his own substance with heavy blows of his hammer.”  Man, the Unknown (Chapter VIII: The Remaking of Man)  1

1935: Jean Coutrot, a French technocrat begins using the word “transhumanisme” in his French writings. ²

1940: W. D. Lighthall, a Canadian poet, writer, historian, and civil servant, was the first to use the term “transhumanism” in English, where he referred to ‘St. Paul’s Transhumanism,’ which could be a tribute to a ‘transhuman change’ described in the 1814 English version of Dante’s Divine Comedy, where one embarks on a journey towards heaven. ²

1942: Julian Huxley, author of Evolution: The Modern Synthesis, writes the term “Evolutionary Humanism”. ⁷

1945: The Holocaust, was a genocide that resulted in the systematic murder of over six million Jews and other groups undesirable to the Nazi regime. The Holocaust marked the end of western affinity for eugenics and similar programs. ²

1948: Robert Ettinger, an author and cryonics founder, inspired by “The Jameson Satellite” publishes his short story “The Penultimate Trump,” in Startling Stories. Ettinger suggests cryonics as a form of “one-way medical time travel to the future,” in which a person is frozen and preserved in the hope of being revived later on.  ²

1950: T.S. Eliot: author of The Cocktail Party writes the words “Transhumanate” and “Transhumanize”. ⁷

1951: Julian Huxley, noted eugenicist and evolutionary biologist coins the term “transhumanism” at a lecture delivered in Washington titled Knowledge, Morality and Destiny. Huxley describes his philosophy as “the idea of humanity attempting to overcome its limitations and to arrive at fuller fruition”.  ²

1954: Jerry Sohl, publishes his sci-fi story “The Altered Ego“, in which a man is able to make a digital duplicate of his mind and access it after his death. This marks the first appearance of mind-uploading in fiction.  ²

1957: Julian Huxley, in his essay Transhumanism further defines the word “Transhumanism”. ⁷

1959: Physicist Richard P. Feynman, presents the lecture, There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom, suggesting the possibility of the manipulation of atoms in synthetic chemistry. The lecture will later inspire the field of nanotechnology.  ²

1959: Teilhard de Chardin, author of L’Avenir de L’Homme (The Future of Man), uses the word “Transhuman”. ⁷

1964: Robert Ettinger, publishes “The Prospect of Immortality,” a manifesto for cryonics. A small number of cryonics societies are established across the US.  ²

1965: Irving John Good, cryptographer and computer scientist publishes “Speculations Concerning the First Ultraintelligent Machine,” the first proposal for a possible future intelligence explosion in machine learning.  ²

1966: Fereidoun M. (F.M.) Esfandiary, in his course New Concepts of the Human uses the word “Evolutionary Transhuman”. ⁷

1967:  Harry Overstreet, a philosopher makes the first mention “extropy” — the attempt to counteract the natural law of entropy — in a 1967 volume of the journal, Physis.  ²

1967: Robert Nelson, a television repairman becomes the first person cryogenically frozen at the Cryonics Society of California where he was its president. The operation was ultimately deemed unsuccessful and Nelson’s clients were “lost.”  ²

1968: Douglas Engelbart, presents The Mother of All Demos at the ACM/IEEE Computing Society’s Fall Joint Computer Conference. Engelbart from the Augmentation Research Center, established many modern computing concepts.  ²

1968: Abraham Maslow, in Toward a Psychology of Being, uses the word “Transhumans”. ⁷

1972: Fred & Linda Chamberlain, establish the Alcor Society for Solid State Hypothermia, later renamed to the Alcor Life Extension Foundation, in Los Angeles. Fred Chamberlain had previously worked as a space program engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  ²

1972: Apollo 17, becomes the final manned mission to the Moon.  ²

1972: The Club of Rome, publishes The Limits to Growth, positing dire projections of a growing global population and dwindling resources.  ²

1972: Robert Ettinger, in Man into Superman, uses the word “Transhumans”. ⁷

1973: F.M. Esfandiary, then known as FM-2030, publishes Up-Wingers: A Futurist Manifesto.  ²

1974: Gerard K. O’Neil, physicist publishes “The Colonization of Space” in Physics Today. O’Neil advocates “finding high-quality living space for a world population that is doubling every 35 years; finding clean, practical energy sources; preventing overload of Earth’s heat balance.”  ²

1974: Dr. Ronald Bennet, Chairman of the Committee for Anti-Aging Research, under his grass-roots campaign PROJECT 1989, brings about The Research on Aging Act of 1974 established the National Institute of Aging to back anti-aging research.  ²

1974: F.M. Esfandiary (FM-2030), in Woman In the Year 2000, uses the word “Transhuman”. ⁷

1975: The L5 Society, is established to continue O’Neil’s work advocating for space colonization. Its members include Eric Drexler.  ²

1976: The Cryonics Institute, is established and freezes its first clients in liquid nitrogen.  ²

1980: The L5 Society, helps defeat US ratification of the Moon Treaty, paving the way for private space exploration and resource exploitation of celestial bodies.  ²

1983: Natasha Vita-More publishes The Transhuman Statement (Manifesto), later revised as The Transhuman Manifesto in 1998.  ^{2, 7}

1986: Eric Drexler, research affiliate with MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, partly in response to The Limits to Growth, publishes The Engines of Creation, which proposes the theory of nanotechnology; “‘molecular assemblers,’ devices capable of positioning atoms and molecules for precisely defined reactions in almost any environment,” as a potential solution to Earth’s limited resources.  ²

1986: Eric Drexler and Christine Peterson, establish The Foresight Institute to “ensure beneficial implementation of nanotechnology.”  ²

1988: The first transhumanist magazine, Extropy: Vaccine for Future Shock, is published by Max More and T.O. Morrow. It is later renamed The Journal of Transhumanist Thought.  ²

1989: FM-2030, publishes the book, Are You A Transhuman?  ²

1990: Max More, a philosopher publishes the essay Transhumanism: Toward a Futurist Philosophy, where he introduced the term “Transhumanism” in its modern sense.  ⁶

1990: Hans Moravec publishes Mind Children, predicting superintelligent robots by 2030.  ²

1991: The Extropians Mailing list is established, the first major online hub for transhumanist ideas to be exchanged. Several prominent writers, theorists, and technologists in the movement regularly post to the boards, which continues to be active today.  ^{2, 7}

1993: Vernor Vinge, science fiction author, computer scientist, and mathematician publishes The Coming Technological Singularity, popularizing the theory of the Singularity and predicting its arrival sometime before 2030.  ²

1993: Max More, a philosopher publishes the essay Transhumanism: Principles of Extropy and continues refining the term “Transhumanism” and coins the term “Morphological Freedom”.

1994: Ed Regis, profiles Max More and T.O. Morrow and others in Wired magazine, “Meet The Extropians.”  ²

1994: The first Extropy Institute Conference on Transhumanist Thought is held in Sunnyvale, California.  ²

1995: Peter Diamandis, establishes the X Prize to fund “radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity.” The board of trustees will later include Larry Page and Elon Musk.  ²

1997: An updated version of Natasha Vita-More’s The Transhuman Manifesto is sent with the Cassini Huygens space probe to Saturn.  ²

1997: The Declaration in Defence of Cloning and the Integrity of Scientific Research is issued.  ²

1998: Nick Bostrom, philosopher founds the World Transhumanist Association with David Pearce. It is later renamed Humanity Plus.  ²

2000: Eliezer Yudkowsky, an artificial intelligence theorist establishes the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which will then become the Center for Applied Rationality, The Singularity Institute, and finally, the Machine Intelligence Research Institute.  ²

2000: FM-2030, science fiction author and futurist, enters suspension at Alcor.  ²

2000: The SL4 mailing list is founded.  ²

2001: James Hughes, is elected secretary of the World Transhumanist Association, formalizing its structures and begins building up an international network of local groups and volunteers.  ²

2002: Elon Musk, founds private space exploration company, SpaceX.  ²

2003: The Methuselah Foundation, is founded by David Goebel and Aubrey de Grey to research rejuvanative life extension technologies.  ²

2004: Nick Bostrom and James Hughes, establish the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, which publishes the Journal of Transhumanism.  ²

2004: James Hughes, publishes Citizen Cyborg and the position of Democratic Transhumanism (a form of technoprogressivism) merging transhumanist and leftist political positions.  ²

2004: Francis Fukuyama, prominent bioconservative labels transhumanism “The world’s most dangerous idea.”  ²

2004: The Transhumanist Cooperative Colloquium was a short-lived attempt at a large transhumanist alliance from Natasha Vita-More.  ²

2004: Max More, formulates the “Proactionary principle” as an opposing viewpoint to the precautionary principle. ⁷

2005: Ray Kurzweil, publishes The Singularity is Near, further popularizing the idea.  ²

2005: Nick Bostrom establishes the Future of Humanity Institute, with associates Anders Sanberg and Eric Drexler. 1

2006: Peter Thiel donates $100,000 to the Machine Intelligence Research Institute and joins its board. Thiel also pledges $3.5 million to the Methuselah Mouse Prize foundation to find a cure for aging. 1

2008: Nick Bostrom and Anders Sanberg publish “Whole Brain Emulation Roadmap,” a manifesto for mind-uploading. 1

2008: Peter Thiel donates $500,000 to fund the The Seasteading Institute to establish experimental research facilities in international waters. Thiel will donate over one million dollars to the institute. 1

2009: Eliezer Yudkowsky publishes the blog and forum, LessWrong, where discussion on artificial intelligence culminates in the infamous thought experiment, Roko’s Basilik and banning of its discussion on the forums. 1

2009: Aubrey de Grey founds the SENS Foundation to pursue research into curing aging with backing from The Thiel Foundation. 1

2011: Max More becomes CEO of Alcor Life Extension Foundation. 1

2011: Google’s X Lab starts working on Google Brain, an artificial intelligence research project. 1

2012: Along with the CIA, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos invests $15 million in D-Wave, a quantum computing company. 1

2012: Google hires Ray Kurzweil to work on machine learning and AI. 1

2013: Larry Page establishes Calico Labs with Arthur D. Levinson, ex-chairman of Apple, as part of Google (since restructured as a subsidiary of Alphabet). Calico pursues a cure for aging and associated diseases. 1

2013: At the Global Futures 2045 International Congress, Ray Kurweil predicts that human beings will achieve digital immortality through mind-uploading by 2045. 1

2013: Zoltan Istvan publishes the dystopian science fiction novel, The Transhumanist Wager, about a future war between transhumanists and the US Government. 1

2014: Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin, and Arthur D. Levinson establish the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences to fund research in understanding living systems and promoting life extension. 1

2014: Nick Bostrom publishes Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, positing AI as the number one existential threat to humanity. 1

2014: Google acquires DeepMind Technologies to merge with its Google Brain project in its quest to “solve intelligence.” 1

2014: On reading Bostrom’s Superintelligence, Elon Musk tweets that artificial intelligence could pose a threat to humanity “more dangerous than nukes.” 1

2014: The $1 million Palo Alto Longevity Prize is announced to fund research into curing aging. 1

2014: Elon Musk tells Aeon magazine there will be people living on Mars by 2040. 1

2014: Google CEO Larry Page tells TED Conference attendees that he would prefer to leave his fortune to Elon Musk than donate it to charity in order to ensure that people will get to Mars. 1

2015: Elon Musk donates $10 million to The Future Of Life Institute to invest in research for the creation of “friendly AI.” 1

2015: Technologist and science fiction author Ramez Naam writes that any Singularity is significantly further away than any predictions made so far. 1

2015: Zoltan Istvan launches a presidential bid on the U.S. Transhumanist Party ticket. 1

2018: The World Health Organization classified aging as a disease. Classifying aging as a disease will allow for rejuvenation treatments to be clinically evaluated, and approved, and insurance companies to provide coverage for these kinds of therapies. 2

Mythology

2105 BCE: Methuselah, a venerated biblical patriarch reputed to have enjoyed a lifespan of 969 years, has become a perennial source of inspiration for contemporary organizations espousing the quest for longevity through scientific advancements, such as the Methuselah Foundation. ⁵

2100-1200 BCE: The Epic of Gilgamesh, a Mesopotamian epic poem, portrays the quest of King Gilgamesh for eternal life.

 

---

Sources:

1. https://hpluspedia.org/wiki/Prehistory_of_Transhumanism
2. https://hpluspedia.org/wiki/History_of_transhumanism
3. https://www.theverge.com/a/transhumanism-2015/history-of-transhumanism
4. https://www.theimmortalistsclub.com/post/why-immortality-matters-to-you-by-carl-carlyle
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methuselah
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_More
7. Center For Transhumanist Studies: Introduction to Transhumanism, https://www.humanityplus.org/