Body, technology and death in posthuman perspective

Abstract

The object of this research is the relevant representations of death, which in many ways are defined by the ideas and practices of embodiment of posthumanism. Special attention is given to correlation between natural and artificial in a human. The article analyzes the corporeal context of death and technical context of body, the interaction of which leads to creation of the project of technogenic immortality. In the present situation, body as a preset biological structure is determined as mortal. Immortality, in this case, is understood as the achievement of post-corporeal state. The work is based on the philosophical-anthropological concepts of innate “biological insufficiency” and “eccentric positionality” of a human that also form his ability to transcending the determinate being. Culture is viewed as the functional expansion of human body. The conclusion is made that the idea of modetnity consists in liberation of human from any external determination, in other words, in autopoiesis. Due to this fact, humanity attempts to transcend the power over own body into the limits of its basic properties – to get rid of death. Posthuman future is achieved through subsequent destruction of “naturalness” of the body.