We stand on the brink of scientific and technical breakthroughs that will give us the power to redesign our bodies and minds. Should we seize upon them to “perfect” ourselves, or do such dreams embody an arrogance that can only destroy what we hold most dear? On Wednesday, April 26th at 5:30 p.m. in the Escondido Theater of the Student Union, the Institute for the Study of Western Civilization will be sponsoring a lecture entitled “Transhumanism and Its Discontents,” addressing this gigantic, and now inescapable, question.
Our speaker will be Dr. Charles Rubin, Associate Professor of Political Science at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who has given it deep and concentrated thought. As he argues in his recent book, The Eclipse of Man, “transhumanism” is a utopian ideology that, stripped of its visionary rhetoric, does little more than justify human extinction. Rather than following its deceptive counsels, he urges a more modest approach that preserves those qualities that ultimately define our humanity.
We hope you will be able to attend this supremely important lecture about the fate of the human species.
