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Making Enhancement Equitable: A Racial Analysis of the Term “Human Animal” and the Inclusion of Black Bodies in Human Enhancement

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Abstract

This article seeks to deconstruct the language employed by critical posthumanism, specifically the term “human animal.” It explores the implications of its use as a blockade against the equitable inclusion of Black bodies in human enhancement. Essentially, it suggests that human advancement has universal implications. This is especially important in considering how enhancement will be distributed among those who do not fit normative humanistic descriptions. The reality of my context is that many Black folks in the United States are just beginning to explore what it means to be both Black and human within the bounds of “equality.” There remains within Black subjects a tremendous amount of baggage associated with historical objectifications, stemming from ancestral experiences and communal narratives. So, when white scholars propose a futuristic critical framework without employing a thorough assessment of race, skepticism from Black scholars regarding equity should be expected. This is especially true when human animality is a key component of that framework.

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... A further shift in view is offered by Steve Fuller in 'Race As a Problem for Black Transhuman Liberation Theology' who suggests an alternative interpretation of race theory through his exposition of Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020, a young US theologian who identifies strongly with the Black liberation movement and sees various features of transhumanist thought as supportive of a project he calls 'Black Transhuman Liberation Theology'. What follows is a wide-ranging critical examination of how Butler positions his project vis-à-vis the concept of race, which he rightly observes has been underexplored in both the post-and trans-humanist literatures. ...
... Introduction Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020) is a young US theologian who identifies strongly with the Black liberation movement and sees various features of transhumanist thought as supportive of a project he calls 'Black Transhuman Liberation Theology' (BTLT). What follows is a wide-ranging critical examination of how Butler positions his project vis-à-vis the concept of race, which he rightly observes has been underexplored in both the post-and trans-humanist literatures. ...
... In the end, I will address the implications of this exploration for our postdigital age. S. Fuller (*) University of Warwick, Warwick, UK e-mail: s.w.fuller@warwick.ac.uk Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020 takes off provocatively from Fanon's observation that the radical otherness of Blacks in a White-dominated society effectively renders Blacks 'non-human', not only to Whites but also to Blacks themselves. Moreover, as Blacks adapt better to White society, they become complicit in forgetting their own racial history. ...
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This conversation between Catherine Keller and Petar Jandrić explores the contemporary relevance of the concept of Apocalypse and inquires into ways of responsible reading of Biblical texts. It introduces the concept of dreamreading and positions it in relation to the concept of prophecy. It presents arguments for rejecting the notion of creatio ex nihilo and proposes a close examination of the theology concerning creatio ex profundis. The conversation outlines the basics of process theology and its complex links to postmodernism and feminism. It moves to the contradiction between universal morality expressed in Scripture and postmodernism’s rejection of universal morality. It outlines Keller’s understanding of theopoetics and explores the transdisciplinary nature of (process) theology. The conversation ends with an in-depth exploration of postdigital theology, addressing postdigital spatio-temporality, transhumanism, posthumanism, Trinity, eco-pedagogy, and the Kingdom of God.KeywordsPostdigitalProcess theologyTheopoeticsApocalypseDreamreadingHeresyCreationismFeminismSexualityPostmodernismWhiteheadLiberation theologySciencePoetryTransdisciplinarity Docta ignorancia Creatio ex nihilo Creatio ex profundis
... Introduction Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020) is a young US theologian who identifies strongly with the Black liberation movement and sees various features of transhumanist thought as supportive of a project he calls 'Black Transhuman Liberation Theology' (BTLT). What follows is a wide-ranging critical examination of how Butler positions his project vis-à-vis the concept of race, which he rightly observes has been underexplored in both the post-and trans-humanist literatures. ...
... In the end, I will address the implications of this exploration for our postdigital age. Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020 takes off provocatively from Fanon's observation that the radical otherness of Blacks in a White-dominated society effectively renders Blacks 'non-human', not only to Whites but also to Blacks themselves. Moreover, as Blacks adapt better to White society, they become complicit in forgetting their own racial history. ...
... However, Fanon was clear that more concrete violence was required for 'decolonization' to fully succeed, including the dispossession and repossession of property and even the elimination and replacement of people. Butler (2018Butler ( , 2020 enters the picture mindful that when Fanon called for sustained violence at several levels to overturn the oppression of Black people, he was not only trying to capture the radical nature of the problem, but also to make a normative point about what Black people are literally 'entitled' to do once they own their 'non-humanity'. If you cannot escape your non-humanity by the rules of the game, then you are allowed to turn that non-humanity to your advantage, since you are simply listening to those who have defined your oppression. ...
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Butler is a young US theologian who identifies strongly with the Black liberation movement and sees various features of transhumanist thought as supportive of a project he calls ‘Black Transhuman Liberation Theology’ (BTLT). What follows is a wide-ranging critical examination of how Butler positions his project vis-à-vis the concept of race, which he rightly observes has been underexplored in both the post- and trans- humanist literatures. Butler’s provocative ‘transhumanist’ angle is that he doesn’t simply critique the US Black community’s historic suspicions surrounding science and technology. He offers some bold proposals for how Blacks might appropriate futuristic technologies to unleash their hidden racial potential. However, I will focus on a rather un-transhumanist feature of his thought – namely, a morphologically fixed conception of race, aka the ‘Black body’. The idea underwrites much of critical race theory, but it sits uncomfortably with the ‘morphological freedom’ that is normally associated with transhumanism. In the course of the essay, I explore the radicalness of the problem that Butler perceives, as well as alternative approaches to the issues surrounding race that may be closer in spirit to transhumanism. In the end, I will address the implications of this exploration for our postdigital age.KeywordsTranshumanismCritical race theoryRaceNationalismLamarckCosmic raceUncanny valleyFanon
... Within these changing narratives around Black opportunities for medical technology and enhancement, Cam holds significance within a posthumanist discourse that has typically lacked Black bodies. 72 Nevertheless, we might pause before making the human animal when s/ he has been animalized before to terrible ends and might also pause before making the Black human post before s/he has ever had the chance to fully experience her humanity. 73 It is here that the novel's genre is so effective. ...
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Interest in epistemological questions is not limited to philosophy today. Numerous empirical sciences have, in the normal course of their research, been forced to proceed from the immediate object of their research to questions involving cognition. Quantum physics is perhaps the best-known example, but it is no exception. In linguistics the question is raised today of what problems arise from the fact that research into language has to make use of language. Cognitive instruments have to be aquired via the object investigated by means of these very instruments and not, for example, through reflection of consciousness upon itself.1 Brain research has shown that the brain is not able to maintain any contact with the outer world on the level of its own operations, but — from the perspective of information — operates closed in upon itself. This is obviously also true for the brains of those engaged in brain research. How does one come, then, from one brain to another? Or to take a further example: the sociology of knowledge had demonstrated at least the influence of social factors on all knowledge, if not their role as sole determinants. This is also true, then, for this statement itself since no justification for an exception can be found, in the sense, say, of Mannheim’s »free-floating intelligence«. What conclusion is to be drawn from this? It was thought that one would have to found all knowledge on »convention«2 or that knowledge was the result of a kind of »negotiation«.3 But these attempts only wound up designating an ancient problem — that of the unity of knowledge and reality — by means of a new concept. Not without reason have these attempts been criticized for epistemological naiveté4, since one either learns nothing about the relationship to reality or the connection is only made over theoretically unacceptable »both/and« concessions. There is little more to be gained by calling such »constructivism«, as has recently been done, »radical«5 since what is identified here as »constructivism« hardly at first seems unfamiliar. It might be that the theory of knowledge — at least in some of its traditional variants — will be confirmed rather than caught unaware. Science is apparently reacting here to its own power of resolution. This can already be found in Plato who reduces everyday experience to mere opinion and raises the question of what reality lies behind it. As a result, these philosophic reflections were termed, at first, »idealism«. As we come to modern times the emergence of modern science led more and more to the conclusion that this »underlying« reality was knowledge itself. This altered the meaning of the concept of the subject, while it is only in our century that the name »idealism« has been replaced by »constructivism«. There was a shift in emphasis in the conflict between realism and idealism, but it is not easy to discover in this a new theory. There is an external world, which results from the fact that cognition, as a self-operated operation, can be carried out at all, but we have no direct contact with it. Without knowing, cognition could not reach the external world. In other words, knowing is only a self-referential process. Knowledge can only know itself, although it can — as if out of the corner of its eye — determine that this is only possible if there is more than only cognition. Cognition deals with an external world that remains unknown and has to, as a result, come to see that it cannot see what it cannot see.
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