Pagan Transhumanism: A Lyotardian Approach to the Sublimity of the Posthuman

Abstract

ABSTRACT According to the vision of the most prominent transhumanists, the posthuman is going to be the updated version of the human: Although more developed and improved, the posthuman will still pertain to the well-known intellectual being that created this civilization through its reasonable thinking and the power of its will. From this perspective, the transhumanist attempts at predicting its existential status, social behavior, and political activity are fully justifiable and necessary. However, from a Lyotardian perspective, this type of previsioning is exactly what postmodern thought criticizes: Instead of creating criteria that will guide our response to future events, we should prepare ourselves to judge without criteria—to confront the sublimity of the post- or inhuman and invent new “language games” that will be compatible with its unique characteristics. In this article, I will attempt to delineate the modernist metanarratives that frame contemporary transhumanist politics and analyze the point of its intersection with the sublimity of the posthuman. Finally, I will suggest a postmodern revision of transhumanist politics by focusing on the Lyotardian concept of paganism.