Transhumanism is a relatively recent intellectual and cultural movement that promotes an interdisciplinary approach to understanding and evaluating potential means for enhancing the human organism, the human race and the human condition. Expressed in broad strokes, transhumanism seeks to produce “posthumans” who will variously live longer, be smarter, be stronger, be more peace-loving, or otherwise constitute an improvement over regular humanity in some nontrivial manner. It aims to achieve its goals primarily through technological innovation in fields such as genetic engineering, neuropharmacology, computer technology, artificial intelligence, and molecular nanotechnology. Some of the less mainstream transhumanist themes include efforts to develop conscious, self-aware computers, efforts to reanimate individuals deemed to be dead by ordinary clinical criteria, and even altering humans with a view to facilitating space colonization.
Transhumanist issues have been the subject of a considerable number of books; I have listed many of these in a short bibliography. While the list is not exhaustive, it is highly representative of the transhumanist literature. The list is presented in order of publication date and includes both works aimed at the intelligent layman as well as works aimed at the professional academic philosopher. Note that this list is not offered as a kind of hermeneutic key or guide to the field but rather merely provided to acquaint the reader with some of the more readable accounts. In each case in this list I have tried to summarize the key message of the book in one or two sentences.
Transhumanist issues have been the subject of a considerable number of books; I have listed many of these in a short bibliography. While the list is not exhaustive, it is highly representative of the transhumanist literature. The list is presented in order of publication date and includes both works aimed at the intelligent layman as well as works aimed at the professional academic philosopher. Note that this list is not offered as a kind of hermeneutic key or guide to the field but rather merely provided to acquaint the reader with some of the more readable accounts. In each case in this list I have tried to summarize the key message of the book in one or two sentences.