A Christian Worldview: Technology & Medicine (3)

Vallance, David (MD)

Part of the A Christian Worldview ~ A. J. Higgins series.

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Self-Salvation Through Transhumanism

In the end, the greatest designer body will turn into a moldering corpse. Even with the most amazing genetic upgrades, the human
container will still wear out. “The wages of sin is death” and “It is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment” (Rom
6:23; Heb 9:27, ESV). Humanists, refusing to accept this cursed limitation, are seeking technological solutions to overcome it. Denying
their place as God’s nite creatures and disowning the consequence of their sin, they believe that they will soon be able to convert
themselves into transhumans, limitless creatures who are better than human. By overcoming mortality and reaching for in nity,
transhuman technology allows man to be his own savior. He will conquer the last enemy, death, by himself (1Cor 15:26).

To transform from a human to a transhuman, a person simply needs to merge with a machine. This idea is not new: the use of
mechanical parts has blessed many people. Orthotics and prosthetics rst gave us peg legs and wooden teeth, then hearing aids and
glass lenses, and now titanium joints, mechanical heart valves, cochlear implants, and biomechatronic limbs. However, as marketing
forces continue to divert the business of medicine away from curing ill patients to enhancing well people, newer bionic devices become
ethically troubling. Implantable computer chips that improve intelligence and memory, for example, would bene t patients with
dementia, but would also attract wealthy narcissists with normal brains.

Proponents of transhumanism, however, see much further. They admire the sleek lines and shining chrome of machinery, and idolize
the purity of purpose and cold logic of arti cial intelligence. They believe that the brain is simply an information-producing machine,
and that human consciousness is reducible to neural circuits and biochemical reaction. If the mind is merely data, then everlasting life
simply requires uploading brain information into a supercomputer.

Once they have ascended to a digital plane of existence by transferring consciousness to an indestructible machine, these futurists
believe that they will enjoy a perfect state of being. By discarding their mortal bodies, they will eliminate sickness and death. They will
run no longer on DNA, that imperfect blueprint from their pre-converted lives so prone to mutation, but on infallible software. With
their ultrafast microprocessors and unlimited memory banks, their mental capacity will expand incredibly. Their new computerized
selves will remember being human, but their minds will be free from human limitations. They will have to become less human to
become superhuman, but this will allow them to bypass the gospel and still secure for themselves that Christian promise of eternal life.

Lessons from Eden and Babel

The tsunami of biotechnology is about to engulf us. Since we have never found a technology we don’t like, we stand gullibly on the
shore, eager for the next big thing. The dehumanizing e ects of modern digital culture have never really fazed us. We see technology
as an unmitigated good and an urgent imperative: What can be done must be done. But we are horribly mistaken. We are wrong to
construe technology as entirely good, or even as morally neutral, because it operates in the shadow of the fall. It produces tools too
powerful for fallen mortals to wield. Our ruined race lacks the ethical heft to handle nuclear bombs and cellular phones and will fall
short again with genetic engineering. Although biotechnology in the right hands has blessed man and glori ed God, the wrong hands
are now exploiting it to defy God and demean His creature man.

“You will be like God,” the serpent assured Eve (Gen 3:5). Satan himself had coveted this autonomy, driven by radical self-love. Rejecting
his place as a created being, he boasted, “I will set my throne on high … I will make myself like the Most High” (Isa 14:13-14, ESV). At the
incident in Eden man took up the Devil’s treasonous pursuit of ultimate control. Greedy to be “like God,” humans rst recreated truth
and morality to their liking, and then set out to seize control of their destiny. Biotechnology brings a quantum breakthrough to this
quest: man has hacked into the genetic program and is now rewriting it to wrest control of his future.

The early rebels of Babel banded together and said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let
us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth” (Gen 11:4, ESV). These ancient conspirators
misused technology to defy God, unify themselves against their Creator, and escape His judgment. Modern rebels, driven by the dread
of death, are again hijacking technology to gain immortality through transhumanism. Rejecting God’s o er of “eternal life in Christ Jesus
our Lord” (Rom 6:23), they think they can thwart the death their sins deserve and so usurp the work of Christ.

The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil informs us that God has wisdom that is His alone, a wisdom beyond human capacity that
we must receive by faith. The future of each person and the whole race belongs in His hands. We therefore must not question His
goodness and wisdom: “Will what is molded say to its molder, ‘Why have you made me like this?’” (Rom 9:20, ESV). We gladly take our
place as God’s creatures and trust Him. He wisely barred Adam and Eve from the Tree of Life to keep them from living forever as fallen
creatures (Gen 3:22). Instead, He has promised a full salvation – eternal, abundant life – to all who receive His Son (John 3:16; 10:10). We
can embrace the human condition, knowing that our destiny is to live forever in a fully reconciled universe (Col 1:20). /
As stewards of our bodies, we must use them for God’s glory; the body of every believer belongs to Christ and is the temple of the Holy
Spirit (1Cor 6:19-20). Thus we pray for good health and welcome medical therapy (3John 2). However, we reject biotechnology as a
savior. We refuse the o er of an ugly disembodied post-human future, and con dently embrace God’s nal solution to frail mortality,
the redemption of the body (Rom 8:23). We know that when Christ returns, He will transform our bodies of humiliation to be identical
to His glorious body (Phil 3:21). Although we now bear the image of Adam, the man of dust, from that day on we will joyfully bear the
image of Christ, the Man of heaven (1Cor 15:49).

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