I've read a couple of Ray Kurzweil's books talking about futurism and the Singularity. I think he's extremely optimistic about it, and some of the things he talks about are way too far out there for me (he wants to resurrect his dead father from memories and DNA), but the implications of the Singularity, some of them at least, have an appeal I can't deny.
I don't think it's really fair to compare the transhumanist idea of immortality with that sold by dogmatic religion, as there is (at least, hypothetically) a sound, physical basis for it. Unfortunately, there is a lot of the transhumanist platform which does get close to dogmatic itself, and Kurzweil himself gets lost talking about the spirituality of the whole thing. I don't care about having a spiritual awakening, but having an indefinite life span? Having a body which is like mine but far more durable and powerful? Putting my consciousness into rich virtual reality situations? Yeah, I'll take five, if you can make 'em.
I don't think it's really fair to compare the transhumanist idea of immortality with that sold by dogmatic religion, as there is (at least, hypothetically) a sound, physical basis for it. Unfortunately, there is a lot of the transhumanist platform which does get close to dogmatic itself, and Kurzweil himself gets lost talking about the spirituality of the whole thing. I don't care about having a spiritual awakening, but having an indefinite life span? Having a body which is like mine but far more durable and powerful? Putting my consciousness into rich virtual reality situations? Yeah, I'll take five, if you can make 'em.
