The Discursive Ethics of Professor Chigirev V.A. and the problem of transhumanism

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Iunatskevich P.I. The Discursive Ethics of Professor Chigirev V.A. and the problem of transhumanism. Saint Petersburg, Academy of Ecosocial Technologies, 2020.
 
According to philosophers, public consciousness evolves through several stages.
The first stage is the archaic, which is characterized by the appearance of the dominant human sensation of «We» and the community-based livelihood.
The second stage is pre-modern, in which people have the feeling of «We» and the feeling of an individual sovereign (master, king, tsar, chief, leader) «I». «We» delegates to an individual «I» the qualities of a superhuman, «blindly follows» and believes in his infallibility. «I», with no social restrictions, exploits faith in himself, makes its will to the law, makes a cult of hemself, implements complete arbitrariness. As a result falls into social derealization, commits social suicide, i.e.he estroys itself and its base. Thus, all monarchies, authoritarian and criminal regimes collapse.
 
 
The third stage is modern, the appearance of the multitude of «I». There is a need for democracy and freedom of speech, civil rights and obligations. Social, moral goals and motives motivate the «I» to build a civil society and economic system, in which social parasitism is organic - the way of life of individual «I» at the expense of other «I». Modern gives rise to subjects - active participants in civil processes and the construction of a social state.
However, faith in money as in God breaks modern, and creates the conditions for the transition to postmodern.
The fourth stage is postmodern. This is an imitation of individual «I» of civil society. Here comes the death of the subject - the citizen and his rights. An imitation of civil society, democratic procedures and freedom of speech arises. Simulacra - imitators of civil processes, and practicables - imitators of a social state and its functions appear.
The fifth stage is after-postmodern. This is a revival of the social subject, the collapse of simulacra and practice practicables.
Technocrats (ideologists and owners of the technological achievements of our time) look at social progress from the perspective of transhumanism
Transhumanism represents human development as follows:
1. The emergence of «Pharmaceutical Human», that is, with an altered state of consciousness resulting from the use of appropriate chemicals.
2. The emergence of the «Genetically Modified Human» (GMH) resulting from genetic engineering and the use of GMOs. We are talking about the development of human beings with a modified genome, that is, with foreign genes.
3. The creation of the «Bionic Human». On the one hand, it is the robotization of the person himself, that is, the introduction of artificial implants or chips into the body and brain, resulting in human-cyborgs, on the other hand, the creation of humanoid robots.
4. «Scientific immortalism», that is, the achievement of immortality, implying two methods. The first one includes the use of biotechnology (stem cells, cloning, cryonics, etc.). The second one includes the use of information and nanotechnology.
The analysis of philosophical and technocratic positions is important for modern philosophy and civil society.
The most important categories of modern philosophy are «after-postmodern», «transhumanism» and the «Others». The «Others» is an environment of human relations that fills each person with a specific content: gives a person a name, God, faith, conscience, education, or makes him a person devoid of moral guidelines. The «Others» is the environment in which a specific person is born, formed, develops, degrades, and dies. The «Others» give the direction for the personal development of each person. This is a social variable. A person can change the «Others», break out of one environment of the «Others» and fall into another environment of the other «Others». Joy and misfortune of the person depend on the human environment in which this person finds himself.
The relationship of the person is always unstable, his thoughts are chaotic, and the person is stabilized by his inner world and communication with the «Others», which each time arrange new accents in understanding a person. And this understanding is unstable, it changes by the «Others» and depends on the «Others».
These «Others» can be not only the family in which the person was born. The «Others» are people through whom a person’s life passes.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The morality of the «Others» is the guarantee of a person’s conscience and motivation for creation. The immorality of the «Others» is the guarantee of double moral standards of a person and his motivation for destruction, causing harm to other people.
Arbitrariness is an unhampered will, own desire. In the modern sense, arbitrariness is interpreted more in a negative context as unlimited willfulness, the absence of justice and legality, and autocracy. However, in a historical context, there is a more precise word and the very concept - human’s will and desire. This is a strong-willed act, a strong-willed action of a human-subject. 
The arbitrariness (human’s will and desire) of the «Others» is genuine transhumanism. The arbitrariness (human’s will and desire) of everyone in estimation of harm of the «Other» is the core (essence) of transhumanism.
The term itself was borrowed from the biologist Julian Huxley, but he was talking about «understanding the new possibilities of human nature» in which a person still remains a person.
In after-postmodern, evolution is considered as a process aimed at improving human nature and the transition to a qualitatively new state - the state of a moral subject. According to Professor Chigirev V.A., the means to achieve this is the use and convergence of high social and humanitarian technologies that provide the assembly of a moral subject and the dismantling of a subject identified by the «Others» as a pest. Many experts believe that for the first time the concept of «transhuman» was described by futurologist F.M. Esfandiary (who took the pseudonym FM-2030), starting from a Nietzschean understanding of man as an intermediate link in evolution from a monkey to a superman. F. Nietzsche, with his «Human is that which must be surpassed» is considered the main inspirer of the transhumanism movement. He defined the transhumanist as a transitional person, as a self-conscious being evolving into a «posthuman» - «a descendant of a person modified to such an extent that he is no longer a human being». As his main features F.M. Esfandiary highlighted the improvement of the body with implants, asexuality, artificial reproduction and distributed personality, that is, the distribution of his consciousness and personality in several bodies - biological and technological one. They have begun to consider a transhumanist who is preparing to become a posthuman.
V.A. Chigirev believes that the «posthuman» cannot arise due to the improvement of the body and prolongation of life. As professor V.A. Chigirev believes, the «Others» simply will not allow him to do this if they identify this process as harmful to them. In postmodern the subject of social processes has died, he is imitated (imitation of civil society, democracy and freedom of speech, fictitious law, etc.). In after-postmodern, the subject is reborn, since it is technically possible (assembly of social subjects based on the application to arbitrary of the «Others» of high humanitarian and social technologies). 
The «posthuman», «superhuman», «god-human» cannot become an immoral being. The idea of eternal parasitism and the exploitation of superhumans of just people in after-postmodern is only a recollection of the experience of postmodern.
Transhumanism originated as an ideological, cultural and intellectual current of postmodern. It began to take shape in the 1980s in California, from where came out the technology of killing the subject, imitating of civil society and the social state (Silicon Valley), and the New Age movement (Esalen Institute). It was founded by philosophers and futurologists who gathered at the University of California at Los Angeles. The leading role was played by the next architect of the «marvelous world», the English philosopher and futurologist Max O'Connor, who took the pseudonym Max More. In 1990, he developed his own doctrine, «The Extropian Principles» (extropy - the degree of vitality or organization of systemic intelligence), outlining the ways of the transition of man into posthuman existence.
In 1992, together with Tom Morrow, he created the Institute of Extropy, which discussed neo-Darwinist futurological projects proposed as the «ideology of the future». Finally, in 2010, Moore became a director of Alcor, the largest U.S. cryonics company. 
Extropian anthropology is «an old humanism, only fully activate» as E. Davis put it. It combined the New Age perspective (sixth race) with technical libertarianism, which does not recognize any natural barriers to human evolution. According to More, «when technology allows us to overcome ourselves in the psychological, genetic and neurological aspects, we, who have become transhumans, will be able to turn ourselves into posthumans - beings of unprecedented physical, intellectual and psychological abilities, self-programming, potentially immortal, unlimited individuals».
Professor V.A. Chigirev believes that this is a postmodern philosophy for which the superhuman and the objects of his continuous manipulation and exploitation are important. This is noticeable in the information series of events consecrated in the media. In the public mind, a parasite person, a fraudster, a businessman without conscience and honor, a human without faith in God, worshiping Satan, Lucifer, the devil and other evil spirits, a person with sexual and mental deviations is cultivated. Society is not given the opportunity to publicly denounce evident damage, evil and devilry. All rostrums are occupied by people of non-traditional moral orientation, propagandizing double moral standards. Their word is at odds with their deed. The ideologist of technocrats Mohr sets out in his works the well-known Gnostic and Theosophical idea of Lucifer – «carrying the light» and rebelling against God, who kept man in darkness.
 
 
 
The ideologist of technocrats More sets out in his works the well-known Gnostic and Theosophical idea of Lucifer – «carrying the light» and rebelling against God, who kept man in darkness. After explaining that his praise of Lucifer is purely abstract, he declares without hiding that his task is to show how fundamentally the value system and views of the Extropians are at odds with the values and worldview advocated by the Christian tradition, which he calls the «irrational religious dogma». The Devil-Lucifer represents for him «power for good», mind, intellect and critical thinking. Having hated the kingdom of God and the requirement to blindly follow the tenets, he «left heaven, this terrible spiritual «State», «becoming a symbol of human’s ability to «eternal progress».
More openly defies an atheistic appeal: «God also dislikes the fact that we can enjoy life. If we have a taste for it, we may lose interest to obedience. We could rather focus efforts to get positive feelings from life, and not to avoid punishment... Lucifer always convinces us that we have no reason to be altruists. We ourselves can choose values for ourselves in the same way as we think for ourselves. For Lucifer himself, such values are the search for happiness, new knowledge and new experience... I want to remind you that all of you are Papas. You yourself are the highest authority for yourself. You yourself are the source of your actions. You yourself, no matter whether actively or not, choose your own system of values and life goals. You yourself choose what to believe, how much to believe and what to perceive as debunking facts. Nobody has power over you - you control yourself, choose an approach to life, think. Join me, join Lucifer and join Extropianism in the fight against God and his entropic powers, devote your mind, heart and courage to this cause... Go to the light!».
What More meant by «light» is evident, in particular, from another of his articles entitled «Sex, Coercion, and the Age of Consent» in which the author defends the right to pedophilia, arguing that «non-coercive sex with minors is not immoral, but is just a matter of taste», the result of non-resistance of the parties.
However, if, as Professor V.A. Chigirev claims, the issue of the right to pedophilia can be put into public discourse, the non-lethal negative correction of the health of carriers of pedophilia ideas can be a private result of such a discussion. 
Discourse, according to V.A. Chigirev, is the most important tool, a technology that transhumanists lack. Discursive ethics is a new practice of transhumanism and technocrats. It, as opposed to dogmatic ethics, gives everyone the right to arbitrariness and gently regulates this arbitrariness by the immediate reaction of the «Others» to the harm of this arbitrariness. That is, if the «Others» accepted the idea of pedophilia, then creative ecstasy happened to the carrier of this idea. But if the «Others» did not accept the idea of pedophilia, then the fate of the pedophile is not enviable. In the postmodern the "Others" are imitated by informational media and visual series in the media and mass culture. Therefore, here you can give out private as general. Perversion can be given the status of a norm. And all this in order to kill the subject, to kill the faith in God and morality in human, all this should be replaced by a thirst for profit and perversion. Thus, in postmodern the subject dies.
However, in the after-postmodern the «Others» have an instrument of influence with which they revive the subject. The spontaneous solidarity of people is ensured by their common morality and the typical mechanism for recognizing personal harm.
However, in 1998, More’s like-minded, Oxford University professor Nick Bostrom (a specialist in cloning, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, cryonics, etc.) and David Pearce (a supporter of «the hedonistic imperative» in the field of introduction of nanotechnology) founded the World Transhumanist Association (WTA). This is a non-governmental organization that has set a goal to get a confession of transhumanism by the wide scientific community and government structures. In 2008, in order for the WTA image to acquire a more «human» dimension, it was called «Humanity Plus».
WTA has prepared the Transhumanist Declaration, which stated not only that advanced technologies will radically change people (overcome aging, the limitations of natural and artificial intelligence, suffering and «imprisonment within planet Earth»), but also the need to uphold the moral right of those who's going to use these technologies in the face of technophobia and ridiculous prohibitions.
This claim for unlimited «man-made evolution» has been strengthened by the following provision: transhumanism «protects the right to a dignified life for all creatures with sensory perception, no matter what kind of brain it is - human, artificial, posthuman or animal one».
Technocrats consider human as an experimental object, as biological material for the application of new technologies. And the use him is not limited to any moral considerations, but is determined only by the rights of the experimenter, which fit into the concept of «human rights» and find expression in the laws of bioethics, which are extremely opportunistic and vary depending on the needs of the customer.
According to V.A. Chigirev discursive ethics is an effective way to ensure the emergence of moral and ethical limitations of interference with nature and attempts to obtain immortality. Discursive ethics allows Orthodox Christianity to become a religion-technology that forms the motivation of people «what not to do», instead of the ineffective propaganda «what to do».
Religion-technology is the study (research) and the impact on people's motivation not with instructions, enumerations of good behavior – «what to do», but with instructions of harmful behavior – «what not to do».
 
 
V.A. Chigirev
V.A. Chigirev
 
 
 
Transhumanism initially declared itself to be a godless anti-Christian worldview that openly rebels against man as a creation of God and the «image of God». But at the same time, transhumanism means the self-destruction of humanism, since it proclaims the abolition of man himself as a «human right».
After-postmodern is a broad movement in which there are various discursive processes that make it impossible to legalize the idea of harm, sin, hell, the devil through public consciousness.
The philosophers of after-postmodernism are united by one thing - the desire to overcome the parasitic human nature in order to achieve a qualitatively new state - a «moral human» through discourses.
What will the discussion of various options for the «evolution» of man lead to? For example, «Pharmaceutical Human», that is, with an altered state of consciousness resulting from the use of relevant chemicals during a wide discussion, can be recognized as «A Human is harming himself» and as a result will not receive the right to his existence from society.
Another model of postmodern human is «Genetically Modified Human» (GMH), obtained as a result of genetic engineering and the use of GMOs. We are talking about the formation of people with a modified genome, that is, with foreign genes (by introducing gene vaccines) that will be immune to any disease, tolerate any temperature, radiation, live under water, be able to fly, have extremely small sizes (to solve the problem overpopulation) etc. Especially great opportunities are provided in this regard by experiments with in vitro fertilization (IVF), in respect of which transhumanists of the postmodern demanded the removal of all prohibitions. Representatives of postgenderism are most active here, advocating generally for the abolition of sexes and requiring a transition to artificial insemination.
If there is an open public discussion of these issues, it is more likely that moral condemnation will occur.
That is, the number of supporters of the improvement of the human race in the name of human rights and minority rights, including the rights of homosexuals, can be negligible.
Tolerance, through which technocrats instill minority rights, is replaced in the after-postmodern with impatience to harm, its instant recognition and negative public assessment.
Religion, which in normal mode is paralyzed by dogmas, if it goes to the format of discursive ethics, becomes a religion-technology, breaks all the achievements of postmodern and phenomenally revives the subject of after-postmodern.
Another subject of public discourse is «Bionic Human». On the one hand, it is the robotization of the person himself, that is, the introduction of artificial implants or chips into the body and brain, resulting in human-cyborgs, on the other hand, the creation of humanoid robots.
During the discourse, immoral tolerance to bionic human is replaced by intolerance towards HARM by the arbitrariness of the «sense» of HARM by the subject.
The final subject of public discourse is «scientific immortalism», that is, the achievement of immortality, which involves two methods. The first one includes the use of biotechnology (stem cells, cloning, cryonics, etc.). The second one includes the use of information and nanotechnology. This is the so-called «mind uploading», in which there is a complete copying of the human brain on a computer to create backup copies of human. This process of «digital metempsychosis» is described in detail in a book by the famous roboticist Hans Moravec from the Carnegie Mellon University in his book «Mind Children: The Future of Robot and Human Intelligence», which has become a classic of extropianism. Since the human person is considered solely as a carrier of genetic information encoded in DNA, and the brain as a neurocomputer, then they are going to achieve immortality in the future through «dynamic transfer» consciousness from one media carrier to another. The idea is that after scanning the structures of the brain with the help of electronics, implement the same calculations that occur in the neural network of the brain. Transhumanists call such «posthumans» the «downloaded». 
Discourse may call into question the safety of crossing human biological boundaries through technology. It is possible to block the act beyond human and the transition to the sphere of the infernal world. 
A moral and spiritual mutation will not happen if the religion-technology can recognize the absence of God-Likeness in the posthuman, that is, any person who considers himself to be God or celestial. 
Any subject who thinks that he's God can be instantly transferred to the social bottom, where social death will happen to him through the subject-object transition characteristic of discourse. The essence of the subject-object transition, according to V.A. Chigirev, is the transition of the discourse initiator to the status of the person being discussed and condemned, contrary to the intentions of its organizer.
The «ecstasy of communications» in the after-postmodern is replaced by the «ecstasy of evaluation» without communications. This substitution allows you to create a new type of addiction – «electronic quasi-drug», the receipt of which is closely related to access to the evaluation of significant subjects with whom there is no communication.
In our time, information has become important, and its meaning has expanded so much that it acquired, as E. Davis writes, a «mystical aura of incorporeality», and became «an almost luminous icon, fetish and logos at the same time». The consumption of large amounts of information has become a new habit of modern human. However, the process of consumption of information does not give a person a tool of his own arbitrariness. Such a tool gives him participation in the discourse and mass ethical, moral evaluation.
When the theory of V.A. Chigireva goes into the field of biology, sociology, psychology and cognitive sciences; this turns the idea of identity of the person. They begin to consider this theory as a dynamic social being, corrected by the «Others» in the course of a continuous, permanent discourse. Everything that happens to a person, his physical and spiritual state is not programmed into DNA, everything is changed by the «Others». Accordingly, the «Others» can give eternal life to a person. 
The idea of V.A. Chigirev about the dynamism of consciousness is already contained in the theory of discourse. This theory claims that any consciousness is corrected by a discursive process, if an object of correction is involved in it. And since a person lives due to social activity, he is also just a social machine, which can be replaced by another moral social machine. The shell remains the same, and the discourse changes its content: from a parasitic person to a moral one.
Culturologist Mark Dery, in his book «Escape velocity: cyberculture at the End of the Century», argues that one of the key conflicts of cyberculture is the contradiction between «dead, heavy flesh», a «rudiment» that is unnecessary for a cyber man, and «ethereal body of information» – a contradiction that is «resolved» by reducing consciousness to pure intelligence.
Thus, transhumanists drive a wedge between the body and the abstract process of cognition, contrasting the fallen flesh, which is responsible for perception, emotions and logic, with the perfect mind, presented as a kind of informational clot of codes, rules and algorithms, which they identify with our «I». 
A worldview arises, according to which the Universe is presented as a kind of automaton, which consists of complex cybernetic systems, or an information matrix, part of which is human intelligence is imprisoned in a corruptible body. The task of the extropian-transhumanist is to free consciousness-intellect from the body and in the form of a supernew immortal being to leave the Earth for the sake of eternal cybernetic life in the Universe.
V.A. Chigirev claims that in this sense, discourse plays a religious, priestly role, kinda offering us the trip to the death of a parasitic social subject to the revival of a moral social subject. The return trip is excluded. The social memory of society can destroy confidence in the subject who will try to return to the immoral path and devilry.
The rocket science of after-postmodern is to create a global moral social network (GMP - the global moral principle). Global moral social network should give everyone the arbitrariness of harm evaluation and limiting subjective arbitrariness to the «Others». 
Most processes in society, economy, and history occur under conditions that imply reaching the singularity point at a certain point in time. The development of this phenomenon is based on the law of hyperbola. Right now, processes that started billions of years ago are approaching their denouement around us. There are forecasts that we will soon reach the point of technological singularity, when the complexity of developing technologies will be beyond human understanding. This may happen in the coming decades. 
However, in our understanding, the singularity is the moment when high humanitarian technologies allow creating a moral social subject and destroying a subject with double moral standards.
This will cause a severe blow to the parasitic worldview, as a result of which the human species will be considered as the most moral and rational form of life on earth.
But this will raise the question of the aim and meaning of science itself, because the creation of a moral human will be the last invention that people will need to make, since this ensures the humanitarian progress of mankind and the establishment on the moral path of an immoral civilization. 
Illiteracy is a condition of informed or thoughtlessly causing damage. Because an immoral specialist is more dangerous than an enemy.
 Scientists and specialists will be called upon in the future under the main condition that they are moral specialists. It is their quantity and quality that will increase. 
In conclusion, it can be noted that in the apocalyptic images created by transhumanists of this new reality, the «superintelligence» appears as higher authority. However, discursive processes in society can give the «superintelligence» a moral compass; make it conscientious and not harmful to other people.
Also, there are two possible sides of the stories. In the first case, «posthumans» will be able to live as «more decent and kind» among people. In the second, they, in order not to harm, will take the position of «not to act», because the one who is forced to act does harm. In order to minimize harm on a discursive basis, the practice of actions of any subject will be continuously adjusted. So it will be possible to change the paradigm of a parasitic person to a moral person. And, perhaps, this change can happen in a short historical time due to the achievements of technocrats who gave the world mass communication, information technology, social networks. However, today there is a massive closure of accounts on social networks. People leave networks, feeling hurt for themselves. How to stop this flow of citizens who have lost confidence in networks? It is necessary to combine the positions of technocrats and philosophers. It is important to create new social networks in which citizens can create themselves as social subjects of influence. Thus, confidence will return in technocratic achievements that meet the requirements of after-postmodern. The combination of technocratic position (transhumanism) and philosophical (after-postmodern) creates conditions for unprecedented humanitarian progress from one model of human behavior to another, more humane and moral, in which the rule of «Three Cs» is implemented (do no harm yourself, neighborhood, the environment with either thought, word or deed; build for yourself, your neighbors, the environment with thought, word and deed).
 
Iunatskevich P.I.
 
Iunatskevich P.I. The Discursive Ethics of Professor Chigirev V.A. and the problem of transhumanism. Saint Petersburg, Academy of Ecosocial Technologies, 2020.