This event at the RSA on 6th October looks amazing! I'm trying to get a ticket for it since it is already fully booked but in any case it is being live audio streamed. Might just sit at home in the warmth with a nice drink and soak in the fun!
How will we ascribe status to human life in a ‘post-human’ world? Should we take post-humanism seriously? If so, how do we define and value our humanity in the face of a future that will only otherwise confer advantage on the few?As we re-engineer the human body, and even human genome, are we attempting to realize dreams that hitherto have been largely pursued as social-engineering projects or are we doing something new?From traders and dreamers to technogeeks and philosophers, whose ideologies run the gamut from collectivism to libertarianism, a large constituency is already engaged with our enhanced future. This constituency may radically reconfigure the global political space.The RSA gathers a high-profile panel of speakers to explore the hidden agendas behind our values and attitudes toward the place of ‘the human’ in today’s societies, and debate what must now be a key issue for the 21st century.Speakers: Professor Steve Fuller, Auguste Comte Chair in Social Epistemology in the Department of Sociology at the University of Warwick and author of Humanity 2:0 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011); Rachel Armstrong, Senior TED Fellow and Co-Director of AVATAR (Advanced Virtual and Technological Architectural Research) in Architecture & Synthetic Biology at The School of Architecture & Construction, University of Greenwich; and China Miéville, Perdido Street Station and Between Equal Rights.
Chair: Dr Andy Miah, Chair of Ethics and Emerging Technologies in the Faculty of Business & Creative Industries at the University of the West of Scotland.
It does look interesting.
Did you see this piece in The Observer?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/25/steve-fuller-time-for-humanity?INTCMP=SRCH
J
Posted by: JohnnyLaird | September 25, 2011 at 06:46 PM