On a quiet morning in the not-so-distant future, a human being wakes to the soft hum of a neural implant seamlessly delivering the day’s information directly to her brain. Her augmented eyes adjust focus automatically, syncing with an AI assistant that anticipates her thoughts. A bio-printed heart beats steadily in her chest, indistinguishable from the one she was born with. In this world, the once-fanciful ambitions of transhumanism have become reality.
Such a scenario reflects the guiding vision of transhumanism: an optimistic belief that humanity can and should deliberately transcend its biological limitations through technology. The term “transhumanism” itself was coined in 1957 by British biologist Julian Huxley, who described it as the idea of “man remaining man, but transcending himself, by realizing new possibilities of and for his human nature.” In Huxley’s words, “The human species can, if it wishes, transcend itself — not just sporadically … but in its entirety, as humanity. We need a name for this new belief. Perhaps transhumanism will serve.”¹
What began as a speculative philosophical vision in the mid-20th century has evolved into a diverse movement at the intersection of science, technology, and human values. Today, transhumanism inspires vigorous debate about the future of our species – from lab bench innovations in gene editing and brain-computer interfaces to ethical quandaries about identity, equality, and meaning. This essay explores the core concepts and implications of transhumanism, surveying its philosophical foundations, goals of human enhancement, convergence with artificial intelligence, and the profound ethical questions it raises. Each theme is examined with insights from contemporary experts and commentators, grounding our journey in the latest thought (2024–2025) on humanity’s potential post-human evolution.
Philosophical Foundations of Transhumanism
Transhumanism’s roots are planted in humanism and Enlightenment ideals, yet stretch outward toward a radically new vision of human potential. Julian Huxley’s original definition set the tone by proposing that humanity could consciously evolve beyond its current form. In his 1957 essay New Bottles for New Wine, Huxley argued that humankind’s self-directed evolution was not only possible but a “real destiny,” heralding a future in which “once there are enough people who can truly say that, the human species will be on the threshold of a new kind of existence.”¹
Over the subsequent decades, this nascent idea was elaborated and refined by futurists and philosophers. In the 1960s, Iranian-American futurist FM-2030 (born Fereidoun M. Esfandiary) began identifying “transhuman” individuals – people adopting lifestyles and technologies as “transitional” stages toward a post-human future.² This laid intellectual groundwork for thinkers like Max More, a British philosopher who in 1990 articulated transhumanism as a formal philosophy. More and others in California created early transhumanist organizations, turning abstract ideas into a movement with manifestos and principles.² By the late 20th century, transhumanism had cohered into “a philosophical and intellectual movement that advocates the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available new technologies,” aiming to greatly improve longevity, cognition, and well-being.²
The World Transhumanist Association (now Humanity+) and similar groups embraced this ethos, explicitly grounding it in humanist values: one definition describes transhumanism as “a cultural and intellectual movement that affirms the possibility and necessity of improving the human condition, based on the use of reason applied within an ethical framework sustained by human rights and the ideals of the Enlightenment and humanism.”³ In other words, the drive to enhance ourselves is framed not as a rejection of humanism, but as its continuation – an extension of humanist faith in progress, science, and dignity, projected into the future evolution of our species.
Underneath these modern formulations lie philosophical questions that have engaged thinkers for centuries. Transhumanist ideas echo ancient quests for immortality and perfection – from the Epic of Gilgamesh and alchemists’ elixirs to Enlightenment-era speculations about indefinite progress.⁴ Some see Nietzsche’s concept of the Übermensch (“over-man” or superman) as a spiritual progenitor, though transhumanists focus on technological transformation rather than Nietzschean self-creation.⁵ More direct influences include the early 20th-century scientist J.B.S. Haldane, who in 1923 predicted that genetics could one day radically alter humanity, and Benjamin Franklin, who mused about science curing old age.⁶ Huxley himself viewed transhumanism as essentially “evolutionary humanism” – humanity taking charge of its evolutionary destiny.⁷
This notion that we can intentionally engineer our future selves is the philosophical heart of transhumanism. It raises profound questions: Is there such a thing as a fixed “human nature” we ought not tamper with? Or is the essence of humanity to strive for improvement, even if that means eventually becoming “posthuman” – a being so transformed as to merit a new definition? Transhumanists overwhelmingly side with the latter, seeing human nature as a work in progress. As scholar Nick Bostrom (a leading transhumanist philosopher) observed, transhumanism is rooted in the simple premise that “we can and ought to become more than human,” using our tools to overcome the limitations that constrain us.⁵
Yet this premise immediately invites debate from philosophers and theologians about what “more than human” really means, and whether the pursuit is noble or hubristic. Critics note that transhumanism carries forward some older utopian currents – faith in reason, progress, and science – but with an almost mythic optimism that technology can solve existential human problems. It has been called a “‘techno-humanist’ religion” of sorts, promising salvation in silicon and genes rather than in a supernatural realm.⁸ Supporters counter that it is simply applied humanism: where humanists liberated us from rigid dogmas in the past, transhumanists seek to liberate us from biological determinism – from the constraints of our flesh and mortality.
This philosophically charged dialectic means transhumanism is not just a tech trend but a worldview in formation. As one historian put it, transhumanism today engages “intelligent, innovative, creative scientists, engineers and computer specialists all over the world” in serious debate.⁶ Far from a fringe fantasy, it is “not a silly idea dreamed up by a few naïve techno-optimists,” argues scholar Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, but a multi-disciplinary attempt to grapple with what our accelerating technologies mean for the future of humanity.⁶ With its philosophical foundations laid by figures like Huxley, FM-2030, More, and Bostrom, transhumanism has evolved from a speculative idea into a global conversation about evolution, ethics, and the destiny of our species.
Aims of the Movement: Transcending Human Limitations
At its core, transhumanism is driven by a simple credo: humans are not the final word in evolution. The movement’s aims center on transcending the biological limits that have always defined the human condition – aging and mortality, physical and cognitive constraints, and even base emotional suffering. In 1998, a group of leading transhumanists drafted The Transhumanist Declaration, whose opening tenet boldly states that “Humanity will be radically changed by technology in the future. We foresee the feasibility of redesigning the human condition…” through overcoming aging, enhancing intellectual capacities, and improving physiological and psychological well-being. In less formal terms, transhumanists often talk about pursuing three primary enhancements – sometimes dubbed the “three supers”: superlongevity, superintelligence, and superhappiness.⁹ Each of these corresponds to a realm of human limitation that technology might abolish:
Superlongevity – the end of involuntary death and aging. Transhumanists aim to extend healthy human lifespans indefinitely, effectively curing aging as if it were a disease. This aspiration ranges from aggressive biomedical interventions (like gene therapies to reverse cellular aging, or therapies to eliminate age-related damage) to the more extreme notion of uploading minds into durable digital substrates. The near-term focus, however, is on tangible anti-aging science. In recent years, longevity research has progressed from speculative to mainstream: by 2023, the first CRISPR-based gene therapy to treat a human disease (sickle cell anemia) was approved, hinting at the medical power to rewrite DNA.¹⁰ Startups and major research initiatives are targeting the hallmarks of aging – senescent cells, telomere shortening, epigenetic changes – with the hope of adding decades of healthy life. A 2024 market analysis projected the global longevity biotech industry to reach hundreds of billions of dollars within the decade, reflecting the serious investment flowing into age-defying science.¹¹ Futurist Ray Kurzweil has popularized the idea of achieving “longevity escape velocity” – a point at which each year, science can extend your life by more than a year, leading potentially to immortality.¹² Kurzweil, now in his seventies, openly declares: “My first plan is to stay alive – reaching longevity escape velocity,” expressing confidence that medical breakthroughs in the 2030s will allow those who survive until then to basically live indefinitely.¹² The implications of superlongevity are staggering: a world where humans might routinely live 150, 200, or 500 years in youthful health, or never die at all unless by trauma. It raises questions of boredom, population, and resource use, but for transhumanists the moral imperative to save lives makes radical lifespan extension a top priority. As pioneer life-extensionist Aubrey de Grey often argued, “aging is a disease, and diseases can be cured.” The conquest of death, in their view, would be the crowning achievement of human ingenuity – a fulfillment of our age-old longing for the Fountain of Youth, realized through science rather than magic.
Superintelligence – the amplification of our intellectual and creative faculties to levels far beyond unaugmented human abilities. Transhumanists anticipate technologies that could greatly enhance cognition, memory, concentration, and even wisdom. Some see this happening via genetic engineering (e.g. selecting or editing embryos for higher potential intelligence), others via neurotechnology – devices or pharmaceutical nootropics that boost brain function. The most transformative path, however, might be through merging human minds with artificial intelligence, effectively fusing our natural intelligence with machine intelligence. We will explore the human-AI crossover in detail in the next section, but as a goal, superintelligence encapsulates everything from having IQs of 500+ to achieving whole new modes of thought inaccessible to normal brains. It also includes collective intelligence enhancements: using networks and brain links to enable minds to share information or even thoughts telepathically through technology. The movement’s more radical visionaries foresee a day when “no one would be smarter than anyone else, because we all could access intelligence amplifiers and vast AI databases at will” – effectively democratizing genius. In the nearer term, even modest cognitive enhancements are pursued: think of neural implants that restore memory in Alzheimer’s patients or boost focus, or brain-computer interfaces that allow instantaneous access to cloud knowledge. The aims of superintelligence reflect both pragmatic hopes (curing brain diseases, closing educational gaps) and lofty dreams (new art forms, solving intractable scientific problems, perhaps even approaching omniscience). It is also intertwined with AI development itself, since advanced AI might either be a tool to increase human intelligence or an independent superintelligence that humans align with. Transhumanists often express a sense of urgency here: human brains have fixed architecture and capacity, which might soon pale next to AI. If we do not enhance ourselves, we risk becoming intellectually obsolete in a future dominated by machines. Thus, boosting human intellect is as much about safeguarding human relevance as it is about self-improvement.
Superhappiness – a term popularized by transhumanist thinker David Pearce, referring to the use of technology to greatly elevate human emotional well-being and eliminate suffering. While less frequently highlighted in media, this aim is deeply philosophical: it asks whether we can re-engineer ourselves to feel more joy, empathy, and fulfillment, and to suffer less from depression, anxiety, and pain. Pearce’s “Hedonistic Imperative” manifesto argues that it may one day be possible (and morally necessary) to biochemically abolish the root causes of suffering in all sentient life. That could entail neurochemical enhancements, brain stimulation therapies, or genetic tweaks that recalibrate our hedonic set-points – essentially hardwiring greater baseline happiness or at least contentment. Even short of that extreme, transhumanists promote technologies for better mood and cognitive health: everything from advanced antidepressants with no side effects to brain-computer interfaces that can induce meditative bliss or manage emotions. Superhappiness doesn’t imply a shallow blissed-out existence; proponents like Pearce suggest it could yield deeper, more meaningful positive states – love, aesthetic enjoyment, spiritual elevation – once freed from the usual neurological constraints. However, it raises thorny ethical questions: Is a life without suffering truly human? Would engineered happiness rob life of its narrative arcs and personal growth which often come through overcoming hardship? Transhumanists respond that much of our suffering (chronic pain, mental illness, extreme grief) is unnecessary and cruel, and alleviating it is a natural extension of humanitarian progress (just as we no longer accept torture or disease fatalism, they argue we shouldn’t accept depression or pain without intervention). The goal of superhappiness is perhaps the most philosophically complex – it treads on debates about the meaning of life, the value of sadness, and the potential “Brave New World” problem of artificial happiness. Yet, in an age when millions already take medications to regulate mood, the transhumanist suggestion is that we will refine these tools vastly, eventually mastering the biology of emotion as effectively as we have mastered many physical processes.
Underlying all these aims is a fundamental principle: morphological freedom, or the right to modify and enhance one’s own body and mind as one sees fit. Transhumanists view the ability to shape our biology as an extension of basic liberty – a freedom that future societies should recognize and protect. What one person might do to achieve “super” capacities could differ (some might choose cybernetic implants, others genetic upgrades, others might abstain), but the movement’s ideal is to make enhancement technologies safe, accessible, and voluntary for all.
In practical terms, transhumanist aims have begun translating into research agendas in multiple fields. By 2025, we see a proliferation of prosthetics and medical implants that restore or add capabilities, AI-assisted cognitive tools enhancing human creativity and decision-making, and ongoing clinical trials of gene therapies that might arrest diseases once deemed incurable. The early 21st century, as one observer noted, is witnessing the “normalisation of enhanced human capabilities” – from something as simple as eyeglasses and vaccines (earlier technologies that improved our natural state) to modern wearables like smartwatches monitoring health, we have been incrementally embracing enhancement all along.⁸ Transhumanism simply pushes this trajectory to its logical (if extreme) conclusion. Why settle for normal human limits, the transhumanist asks, when we have the tools to move beyond? It is a question that carries both profound promise and peril, which the subsequent themes will further explore.
Merging Minds: The Cross-Over Between Human and AI Consciousness
One of the most exhilarating and unsettled frontiers in transhumanist thought is the potential convergence of human and artificial intelligence. In the transhumanist future, the boundary between mind and machine may blur, raising the prospect that human consciousness could eventually intermix or even fuse with AI. This cross-over encompasses both present reality – such as brain-computer interfaces that allow humans to control machines with thought – and future speculation, like uploading minds into computers or networks of AI augmenting our thinking from within.
Current State: Today’s achievements in neural interface technology provide a tantalizing glimpse of how human brains and AI algorithms can cooperate. In research labs, paralyzed individuals have regained abilities through direct brain-machine links that would have seemed miraculous a generation ago. For example, in 2025 University of California scientists reported “thrilling progress” using brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) in conjunction with AI: a man who had lost the ability to move or speak due to a stroke was able to control a robotic arm using only his thoughts, guiding it to perform tasks like grabbing a cup and bringing it to his lips.¹³ Sensors implanted in his motor cortex decoded the electrical patterns of intended movement; those signals were then interpreted by machine learning algorithms that translated them into real-time robotic action.¹³ In another case, researchers at UC Davis restored a semblance of voice to a patient with ALS by training an AI to convert the patient’s neural signals into synthesized speech, including tone and inflection.¹³ These advances rely on AI’s pattern-recognition prowess to make sense of the brain’s complex signals. As Dr. Karunesh Ganguly, a neurologist developing BCI systems, explained, “This blending of learning between humans and AI is the next phase for these brain-computer interfaces… It’s what we need to achieve sophisticated, lifelike function.”¹³ The phrase “blending of learning” is key: the AI continuously adapts to the user’s brain signal changes (which naturally fluctuate day to day), and in turn the human brain adapts to the AI’s presence, forming a co-evolving human-machine system.¹³ In effect, the person and the algorithm learn from each other, gradually synchronizing. Such developments hint at a future where neural implants augmented by AI could become as common as pacemakers – not only to repair lost function but to grant new capabilities. Even now, non-invasive BCI headsets with AI “co-pilots” are being tested to help users mentally control cursors or devices with improving speed and accuracy.¹³ We are still in the early stages, but the trajectory is clear: the direct coupling of human neural activity with AI-driven computation is advancing rapidly.
Future Prospects: Looking ahead, transhumanists envision far more intimate integrations of mind and machine. The most famous and optimistic voice here is Ray Kurzweil, who predicts that by 2045 we will reach a technological “Singularity” – a moment when human intelligence merges with artificial super-intelligence to such an extent that it marks a new epoch of consciousness. Kurzweil believes that tiny brain-implanted devices (what he calls “nanobots – robots the size of molecules”) will non-invasively connect our neurons to the cloud, linking us to virtually unlimited computing power.¹² “The Singularity will occur when we merge our brain with the cloud,” he explains, envisioning humans as hybrids of biological and artificial cognition.¹² “We’re going to be a combination of our natural intelligence and our cybernetic intelligence, and it’s all going to be rolled into one,” Kurzweil says, predicting that such brain-computer interfaces will enable us to “expand intelligence a millionfold by 2045” while “deepening our awareness and consciousness.”¹² These claims, while dramatic, encapsulate the transhumanist hope that AI can be harnessed not to compete with us but to complete us – to take our minds to levels unachievable by biology alone. If a human brain connected to cloud AI could seamlessly query vast databases, calculate complex problems, or even run multiple streams of thought at once, it would indeed represent a profound leap in intelligence. Such a being might quickly outpace even the smartest unenhanced human, just as our current selves far exceed the cognitive capacity of early Homo sapiens.
Transhumanists often argue that merging with AI is not just desirable but necessary: as artificial intelligences become more powerful (with Artificial General Intelligence possibly emerging this century), the only way to avoid being left behind or dominated by AI might be to join with it. Kurzweil puts it in reassuring terms – akin to getting a smartphone “inside your head” – where you still feel like you, just a vastly augmented you.¹² Skeptics find this vision unsettling, even dystopian, imagining a loss of individuality or the intrusion of corporations literally into our minds. But Kurzweil and allies counter that once upon a time people feared glasses, telephones, and the internet, and now these are mundane extensions of ourselves.
Another prospect is mind uploading – transferring or copying the contents of a human mind into a digital substrate (a computer simulation), which would blur the line between human and AI consciousness in a different manner. If one could simulate a brain neuron-for-neuron in software, the resulting digital mind might think and feel as the person once did, but run on a machine that could merge with other software, replicate, or expand its capabilities. Though still entirely theoretical, a few transhumanists view mind uploading as the ultimate crossover: a way to become an AI while retaining one’s humanity, achieving a form of digital immortality and superintelligence at once. Kurzweil himself predicts that by the 2040s we will have the technology to “upload our minds so they can be restored – even put into convincing androids – if we experience biological death.”¹⁴ This “after-life” technology would raise extraordinary ethical and metaphysical questions (Is the uploaded mind you or just a copy? Does it have rights? What is the value of a physical body?), questions that philosophers and futurists are already grappling with in anticipation.
While full mind uploading remains speculative, incremental steps toward it are being pursued in neuroscience: for instance, projects mapping the connectome (the brain’s neural network map) and advances in AI that mimic brain learning patterns. Each year, our understanding of consciousness – whether an algorithm can have it, whether it can be separated from the biology that produced it – is tested anew as AI capabilities grow. In 2023 and 2024, large language models like GPT-4 surprised the world with their human-like fluency, prompting debates about whether they possess any glimmers of understanding or if they might in the future. Transhumanism directly engages with these questions: if an AI becomes conscious, is it now part of the “family” of intelligent life we care about? Could a human mind and an AI mind share a fused consciousness in some symbiotic way? These are no longer purely science-fiction musings but fodder for serious ethical discourse as the lines between human cognition and machine computation begin to intersect.
Implications: The implications of human-AI crossover are vast and double-edged. On one hand, merging with AI could mean a world of unprecedented knowledge and creativity. People could communicate mind-to-mind across distances, achieve greater empathy by literally sharing thoughts, or collectively solve problems by pooling mental resources. Disabilities could vanish as neural prosthetics bridge any gaps – a paralyzed person might walk via a robotic exoskeleton controlled by their thoughts, a blind person might see through AI vision implants, and so on. The human experience itself might broaden: imagine perceiving infrared or ultraviolet light through bionic eyes, or “thinking” in multiple languages instantly, or remembering every detail of one’s life with perfect clarity using memory chips. Such enhancements hint at what a “posthuman” consciousness might be like – perhaps as far beyond ordinary human minds as ours are beyond those of other primates. It’s a vision of augmented personhood, where technology isn’t an external tool but an integrated aspect of self.
On the other hand, the risks and challenges are profound. There is the loss of privacy and mental autonomy – if your brain is connected to the internet, could it be hacked or manipulated? (One of Harari’s warnings is precisely about the ability of regimes or companies to “hack humans” by tapping into our neurodata.¹⁵) There is the potential social divide: if brain augmentations are expensive, an enhanced elite could arise, leaving “unenhanced” humans at a stark disadvantage – effectively a new species divergence between Homo technologicus and Homo naturalis. Ethically, issues of identity surface: if your memories and thoughts partly reside in the cloud, are you still the sole author of your mind? Do you lose some humanity when your cognition is partly artificial? Or do we simply expand the definition of humanity to include cybernetic parts (much as we already accept that a person with a pacemaker or Cochlear implant is fully human, just with helpful extras)?
Transhumanists often argue for the latter, seeing no reason why a mind that uses silicon or AI support is any less authentic than one running on organic neurons. The term “cyborg” (cybernetic organism) has already been applied to contemporary humans with prosthetics or implants, and it may become commonplace. As philosopher Stefan Lorenz Sorgner suggests in his book We Have Always Been Cyborgs, the fusion of human and tool is an ancient story – our ancestors with spears and eyeglasses were, in effect, beginning the cyborg age; BCIs and AI are its latest chapter.¹⁶
A further implication touches on the realm of consciousness and rights. If a human mind does merge or closely collaborate with an AI system, at what point do we attribute consciousness or personhood to the AI? Already, advanced AI like deep neural networks can exhibit learning and behavior that astonishes us, but we treat them as property or mere code. In a future crossover scenario, the moral and legal status of hybrid intelligences could become contentious. Imagine a situation where part of your cognition is powered by an AI in the cloud – if that AI portion malfunctioned or was modified by a company, is that an assault on you? Does deleting an uploaded mind count as murder? These almost sci-fi hypotheticals will demand new frameworks of law and ethics. Transhumanist thinkers are aware of this and have even proposed preliminary ideas like a “Charter of Cognitive Liberty” or digital personhood rights to ensure that as we integrate with AI, fundamental rights and identities are safeguarded.
The successful cross-over between human and AI consciousness – if achieved – might stand as one of humanity’s greatest milestones. It would also force us to finally confront age-old questions: What is the mind? What is the self? If parts of “me” can be copied, shared, or expanded onto machines, do I have a soul or essence that remains uniquely mine? In grappling with these questions, transhumanism straddles not only technology and science, but also the deepest philosophical and spiritual inquiries. The movement’s optimistic answer is that we can find ways to retain our humanity while embracing the machine, emerging as something new but not necessarily alien. Detractors worry that in trying to become more than human, we may inadvertently become less – losing the ineffable qualities of vulnerability, intuition, or the natural flow of life that make us who we are. The remainder of this exploration will delve into those ethical and philosophical concerns, as well as the practical steps being taken now that make these futuristic scenarios ever more plausible.
The Transhumanist Present: Enhancements in Society Today
While transhumanism often points to the horizons of tomorrow, many of its core ideas are already permeating society in subtle ways. We live in an age of augmentation, where human life is entwined with technologies that amplify our abilities and reshape our experiences. From the smartphones in our pockets to the medical devices in our bodies, the seeds of a transhumanist future are visible all around us. As one observer noted in 2024, the pros and cons of technologies that “purport to enhance human capabilities” are now a topic of “near-constant debate,” given the surge of tools like VR headsets entering the consumer market and AI assistants becoming daily workplace tools.⁸
In many respects, the transhumanist age has already begun on the Internet and in our digital lives. Consider how the global information network has effectively become an extension of our brains: we offload memory to cloud storage, use Google as a factual prosthesis, rely on GPS for navigational intuition, and maintain rich social bonds in virtual spaces. Futurist and entrepreneur Elon Musk has quipped that “we are already cyborgs” because of our deep dependence on phones and computers – our natural abilities are continually supplemented by these external digital aids. Indeed, tasks that once required significant human mental effort (like complex calculations, linguistic translation, or sifting through libraries for research) can now be done almost instantaneously with AI-powered software. The average person with a smartphone today has access to more knowledge and cognitive leverage than any genius of centuries past. In this sense, the internet functions as a kind of global neural prosthetic, turning humanity into a distributed supermind of sorts (albeit one with frequent distractions and misinformation in the mix).
Online personas and social media also hint at a transhuman twist: we curate digital identities that can outlive our biological selves, our Facebook profiles and tweets forming an external memory and legacy. Some have started to use AI chatbots trained on a person’s writings to create a simulacrum of their personality – a primitive step toward the old sci-fi idea of “uploaded” consciousness existing in cyberspace. While these bots are nowhere near truly conscious, they illustrate how even our notion of self is expanding into the digital realm in everyday life.
In the medical sphere, cyborgification is already saving and improving lives. Millions of people rely on enhancement devices: cochlear implants grant hearing to the deaf, artificial lenses in cataract surgery restore sight (often better than original vision), deep brain stimulators help control Parkinson’s tremors and even moderate severe depression by sending targeted electrical pulses into the brain. Prosthetic limbs have become astonishingly advanced – modern bionic hands can be controlled by the user’s own muscle signals or neural interfaces and even provide sensory feedback of touch.¹⁷ In 2024, researchers demonstrated brain-computer interface systems that allow prosthetic hands to transmit feelings of pressure and texture directly to the brain, making them feel almost like natural limbs.¹⁸ Each of these medical technologies begins as a therapeutic intervention but often ends up enhancing the user beyond their original state: a prosthetic leg, for instance, might enable running with far less fatigue than a biological leg, or an implant may give someone the ability to interface with digital devices in ways not possible for an unaugmented person.
Even outside of medicine, consumer tech is blurring human-machine boundaries. Athletes and hobbyists experiment with exoskeleton suits for increased strength or endurance; wearable gadgets constantly track our biometrics (heart rate, sleep cycles, blood oxygen) and give us data-driven feedback to optimize our performance and health. Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality devices overlay digital information onto our sensory field, effectively blending real and virtual worlds in our perception. In a very literal sense, such AR glasses or mixed-reality contacts (now in development) are enhancing human perception – giving us a kind of “digital sixth sense” about our environment (e.g. showing navigation directions, identifying people with facial recognition, etc., in real-time). These trends echo what scholar Alexander Thomas observed: that the “normalisation of enhanced human capabilities is a longstanding feature of scientific and capitalist endeavour,” from old inventions like eyeglasses to modern wearables.⁸ Each step makes the next seem less radical.
Furthermore, AI has become a cognitive assistant woven into daily routines. In 2024–2025, millions of people began using generative AI systems (like ChatGPT, Bard, or others) to brainstorm ideas, summarize readings, write code, compose music, and even provide emotional support. This effectively gives individuals a thought-partner with superhuman knowledge and speed on demand. Students use AI tutors to grasp difficult concepts; artists use AI tools to augment their creativity with novel styles; doctors rely on AI for diagnostic suggestions; writers co-create stories with AI. While not a chip in the brain (yet), these developments mean many people now work and think in tandem with artificial minds on a regular basis. The AI doesn’t need to be conscious to serve as a kind of bolt-on to our own intelligence. As the technology improves, the synergy approaches what transhumanists predicted: a person-plus-AI can accomplish tasks neither could do alone, effectively creating a human-AI team intelligence. Interestingly, a 2023 study in Nature found that naive combinations of human and AI can sometimes perform worse than either alone, largely because humans may overtrust or mismanage the AI’s input.¹⁹ This underscores that effective enhancement is not automatic – it requires understanding the tools and adapting our behaviors. Nonetheless, with iteration, many human-AI collaborations are proving fruitful. Society is gradually updating its perception of what an individual can do when empowered by advanced tech, a concept at the heart of transhumanism.
It is also worth noting how transhumanist ideas are openly discussed and diffused in popular culture. Not long ago, proposals like cyborg bodies or designer babies were relegated to science fiction. Today they feature in mainstream discourse: ethicists debate the morality of CRISPR gene-edited embryos on news outlets, the prospect of AI implants is floated by tech CEOs at conferences, and serious money is invested in startups pushing the envelope of augmentation. The U.S. Transhumanist Party, founded in 2014, even ran a presidential candidate (Zoltan Istvan) on a platform of prioritizing science and technology to improve human lives – an admittedly fringe endeavor, but symbolic of transhumanism’s journey from obscure futurist circles into the public arena. Meanwhile, the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated acceptance of biotech solutions (like mRNA vaccines) and remote/digital life, possibly softening the psychological barrier to more radical technological interventions. A generation growing up with Google as an external brain and TikTok algorithms shaping their attention might find the concept of integrating tech into themselves less alien than their predecessors did.
In sum, elements of transhumanism are already present: we see it in the person who can’t imagine life without their smartphone (a cybernetic attachment), the amputee running on carbon-fiber blades faster than most of us can on flesh, the patient whose mood is stabilized by a brain implant, the gamer who spends more time in virtual worlds than the physical one, and the everyday reliance on AI’s guidance. Each of these is a small step over a line that once separated human from machine, natural from artificial. While we have not yet crossed into the full realization of transhumanist dreams (no one has an AI in their cortex or an indefinite lifespan just yet), the trajectory of progress is clearly pointing in that direction. As philosopher Andy Clark famously said, human beings are naturally “cyborgs” – our minds have evolved to annex whatever tools we create as part of ourselves. We embraced writing to extend memory, telescopes to extend vision, engines to extend muscle power. Transhumanism extends this logic: the tools will become so integrated and powerful that they qualitatively change what we are. If we recognize how much we’re already entwined with our technology, the future leaps may seem less like alien transformations and more like a continuum of the human story – albeit one reaching unprecedented heights. The key question is whether society will guide these changes responsibly and inclusively, or whether we will stumble into them blindly, not realizing we’ve been living in the transhumanist era until it’s fully upon us.
Endnotes
- Julian Huxley, “Transhumanism,” in New Bottles for New Wine (London: Chatto & Windus, 1957).
- “History of Transhumanism,” Wikipedia, accessed October 6, 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_transhumanism.
- “Is Transhumanism a New Religion?” Catholic News Agency, May 22, 2025, https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/251305/is-transhumanism-a-new-religion.
- “Transhumanism,” Wikipedia, accessed October 6, 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism.
- “Übermensch,” Wikipedia, accessed October 6, 2025, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Cbermensch.
- Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, “The Transhumanist Imagination: A Critical Look,” ASU News, September 18, 2012, https://news.asu.edu/content/transhumanist-imagination-critical-look.
- “Evolutionary Humanism,” Metanexus, accessed October 6, 2025, https://metanexus.net/evolutionary-humanism/.
- Alexander Thomas, Transhumanism and the End of Capitalism: A New World Theory (London: University of East London, 2024), https://www.uel.ac.uk/research/transhumanism-and-end-capitalism-new-world-theory.
- Alexander Thomas, “The Three ‘Supers’,” in Transhumanism and the End of Capitalism: A New World Theory (London: University of East London, 2024).
- “2023’s Biggest Breakthroughs in Science and Technology,” RBC Wealth Management, December 14, 2023, https://ca.rbcwealthmanagement.com/explore/articles/2023s-biggest-breakthroughs-in-science-and-technology.
- “The Longevity Biotechnology Market 2024,” Aging-US, Vol. 16, 2024, https://www.aging-us.com/article/205569/text.
- Ray Kurzweil, interview by Nosheen Iqbal, “‘We are going to expand intelligence a millionfold by 2045’,” The Guardian, February 2, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/feb/02/ray-kurzweil-we-are-going-to-expand-intelligence-a-millionfold-by-2045.
- “Brain-Computer Interfaces Are Getting Better and Better,” University of California, April 19, 2024, https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/brain-computer-interfaces-are-getting-better-and-better.
- Kurzweil, interview.
- Yuval Noah Harari, “Here’s why we need to regulate technology,” World Economic Forum, January 24, 2020, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/yuval-hararis-warning-davos-speech-technological-dystopia-surveillance-ai/.
- “John Cabot University Professor Stefan Lorenz Sorgner Publishes Book ‘We Have Always Been Cyborgs’,” John Cabot University News, October 11, 2021, https://news.johncabot.edu/2021/10/stefan-sorgner-cyborgs/.
- “The Bionic Hand that Can See and Think for Itself,” UChicago Medicine, January 11, 2023, https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/research-and-discoveries-articles/bionic-hand-that-can-see-and-think-for-itself.
- “A Prosthetic Hand That Can Feel,” Pitt Med School, accessed October 6, 2025, https://medschool.pitt.edu/news-and-media/research/prosthetic-hand-can-feel.
- G. B. Frisoni et al., “Human–AI collaboration in clinical decision-making,” Nature, October 18, 2023, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02604-x.