JUSTIN D. BARNARD, PH.D.A S S O C I AT E D E A N, I N S T I T U T E F O R I N T E L L E C T UA L

D I S C I P L E S H I PA S S O C I AT E P R O F E S S O R O F P H I L O S O P H Y

U N I O N U N I V E R S I T Y

SEPTEMBER 21 , 2013

The New Adam:Toward a Theology of Imago Dei

Ray KurzweilAuthor of The Singularity is Near

(2005)

The Future of Humanity1. Slow

down/reverse aging and disease process

2. Reprogram human biology (through both genetics and nanotechnology)

3. Perfect digital-brain interface capacities for virtually limitless possibilities

Being Human: Post-Enlightenment

Being Human = nothing more than a materially-instantiated center of consciousness.‘Consciousness’ is understood entirely

in functional terms – i.e., instrumental rationality (means/end reasoning) to satisfy the will (where ‘will’ is primarily identified with appetites, wants, desires)

Instrumental

Rationality

Will(wants, desires)

Conscious Self

Post-Enlightenment Consequences

1. The solitary, individual ‘self’ becomes the central metaphysical unit of reality.

2. Autonomy becomes the chief value.3. All relationships among selves

become structured networks of power grounded in ‘rational self-interest’.

4. Human beings are ‘persons’ only for as long as their consciousness exists/persists.

Consequences for Bioethics

• Articulates the powers of the selfAutonomy

• Protects the self and its powers

Non-maleficenc

e• Concerns exchange of goods

owedJustice

• Concerns transfer/dispersal of goods not owed

Beneficence

Ethical Robot

Do Good

Prevent Harm

Be Fair

Michael Anderson and Susan Leigh Anderson, “Robot Be Good,” Scientific American (October 2010): 72-77

C.S. Lewis: Abolition of Man “Men Without Chests”

“The head rules the belly through the chest– stable sentiments– these are the indispensable liaison offers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man . . .”

Critique: Post-Enlightenment View

Limitations Imago Dei

Unexplained conversation stopper

Explained in functional terms Ex: rationality,

creativity, capacity for ‘dominion’

Typical Christian Response

An Alternative Christian Reflection

Trinity

Eschatology

Incarnation

Being Human: Eschatology

Thinking eschatologically . . . 1. Chastens reflection on what it

means to be human2. Disabuses us of foolish, myopic

quests (e.g., immortality, unleashing human potential)

3. Clarifies a Christian outlook on death

Being Human: Incarnation

Thinking incarnationally . . .1. Means more than mere physicality2. Takes the organismal unity of the

human body as central to being human3. Rejects any view that reduces being

human to mere possession of a transferable consciousness (where the ‘material’ upon which it operates is a matter of indifference)

Being Human: Trinity

Thinking in Trinitarian terms . . .1. Removes the error of treating the

solitary self as the as the central unity of reality

2. Relativizes the significance of autonomy

3. Signals the primacy of the loving relationships in which we are embedded as vital to being human

Conclusions

Being made Imago Dei means being a creature whose intrinsic communion with/for love of God and neighbor and organismal unity make it a candidate for an eschatological existence in (partial) continuity with its present one.

Conclusions

Proposals to “reinvent humanity” in ways that deny either . . .1. The primacy of our intrinsic loving

communion, or2. The significance of organismal unity,

or3. The necessity of our eschatological

existence

. . . should be regarded as sub-human