Do you remember The Six Million Dollar Man? It was a '70s American science-fiction television series based on the novel Cyborg, about a former astronaut, Colonel Steve Austin. After being seriously injured in a NASA test flight crash, Austin is rebuilt with bionic implants that give him superhuman strength, speed, and vision. Austin is then employed as a secret agent by a fictional U.S. government office called OSI. What was a creative fictional story 50 years ago is now becoming reality through the philosophical and scientific movement named transhumanism.

In 1957, Julian Huxley summarized the term transhumanism as “man remaining man, but transcending himself, by realizing new possibilities of and for his human nature”[1]. Transhumanism uses current and emerging technologies to augment human capacities and improve the human condition (Encyclopedia Britannica). Transhumanism can be very popular, as it advocates for what human have dreamt of for a long time: longevity, intelligence, and happiness. However, as scientific innovations accelerate, so do debates about whether transhumanism represents a cultural revolution, a technological miracle, or potentially the end of our civilization as we know it. This post explores the........

© Psychology Today