Publication details
Does science mutate into religion? A case of transhumanism
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Year of publication | 2013 |
Type | Conference abstract |
MU Faculty or unit | |
Citation | |
Description | This paper is a case study of transhumanism, a contemporary international movement and a science-based philosophy. The transhumanism carries many signs of what we often designate as religion: believing in immortality, expectations of an end of this world and a beginning of a new age etc. This paper reveals the transhumanism as a case of a new religious form growing out of science. As a kind of late modern variation of dualism, the movement is focused on an eschatology of biotechnology (The Singularity) and a soteriology of human soul released from the shackles of the body into an universal intelligence network. The paper tries to understand this phenomenon in a wide context of history of science in terms of the Latourian analysis of modernity. Involving the notions of Actor–Network Theory, it reveals the transhumanism as a manifestation of contemporary transformations of religion. |