Two kinds of posthumans

Posthumans are future beings who greatly exceed, in terms of their basic capacities, what present-day humans are capable of, with respect to healthspan, cognition and emotion. Furthermore, on this conception of the term, posthumans may or may not be "phylogenetically" related to humans: they may be completely synthetic beings, such as strong AI systems, rather than biotechnological hybrids (via cyborgization).

At the risk of silliness, one might then distinguish between post-humans and post-humans: the former would refer to a posthuman entity that non-human in nature, while the latter to a posthuman entity that has (or had in its past) biological components. An android would count as a post-human, while an advanced cyborg would count as a post-human.

For more on the relation between cyborgs and posthumans, see my most recent article on the IEET website.

Intelligence and Progress

New post up on the IEET website entitled "If Only We Were Smarter!" Has received far more hits than expected. Maybe the counter is malfunctioning?

Past articles include:

What are "Biological Limitations" Anyway?

Will Cognitive Enhancement Technologies Make Us Dumber?

and...

Rational Capitulationism