The ebullient transhumanist and the sober theologian

Abstract

The worldwide transhumanist (H+) movement upgrades technological hopes and expectations to a level of spiritual fervor. When looking through the eyes of the public theologian, we see in H+ a disguised religion replete with faith in techno-salvation and even immortality. This is unrealistic. Whereas H+ assumes enhanced intelligence has redemptive power, the more realistic theologian avers that it is love and love alone that has transformative power. The implicit Gnostic assumptions of H+ are too weak to redeem the human condition; they need fortification by a hard-nosed sin- and-grace dialectic. Apologetic public theologians can offer the wider public a more realistic assessment of technology’s potential while providing genuine hope in a future vision based on divine promise.