File spoon-archives/lyotard.archive/lyotard_2004/lyotard.0404, message 42


From: swilbur-AT-wcnet.org
Subject: Re: it gives me hope
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2004 13:40:20 US/Eastern



This is "transhumanism" of the FM Esfandiary
(FM2030)/Upwinger variety - a sort of technophilic
cult that goes back to the '70s. I'm not sure it
makes much sense to compare the kind of "heroic,"
individualist upwinger, so convinced and enamored
of change and progress that all the trappings of
identity become hinderances to "upwinging," with
the grunts and tars roped into the atomic tests.
Obviously, since we don't share the Gernbackian
optimism that drives them, we are likely to see 
them as complicit in the very messy, costly
business of technological development, where, as
you say, things don't work out as smoothly as 
some would like to imagine. My reading of this
crowd - and i read quite a bit of Esfandiary back
when i was working "cyberpunk" territory - was 
that there was a good deal of elitism, married to
a kind of rightwing "libertarian," let the fruits
go to those who dare, kind of mentality. It's not
the sort of worldview i would promote, though it's
perhaps a tad less objectionable than the "mind
children" stuff. I imagine the transhumanists 
think of themselves as experimenting as much as
being experimented on - an attitude they share 
with gazillions of body modifiers of various 
sorts. And, no doubt, they're right to some extent.
In any event, it's a bit hard to see the "fascism"
here. 

-shawn




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