Adam Kirsch's brief, but highly informative work of synthesis tracks two intellectual currents from the fringes that are beginning to bubble up into mainstream culture. Both involve the future, one with no people. There's the Anthropocene world view which argues human activity from its very beginning began to change the ecosystem of the earth for its own ends. All the climate catastrophes we face are a direct result of human activity - and they welcome the extinction of humanity as the best thing for mother earth. Meanwhile, the transhumanists believe technological advancement will not only extend human life but will lead to the next step in evolution that will leave humans obsolete.
A growing number of scientists, poets, activists, and philosophers believe humanity has already doomed itself to extinction and there's no going back. The only question is whether the extinction will be fast or slow. Will it be a Children of Men situation, when the last remnants of humanity devolve into violence and rage? Ultimately, a planet without humans will see a restoration of nature in perfect harmony. A 2019 novel The Overstory by Richard Powers posits that trees are superior to people for many reasons; trees are peaceful and flourish for thousands of years. While humanists privilege consciousness and intelligence, most of the Anthropocene worldview consider non-human life and inanimate objects like rocks to be far superior.
Many are also avid Anti-Natalists, with varying degrees of radicalism. South African philosopher David Benetar in Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence argues the act of procreation only brings more suffering into the world, he envies those who never existed. Others favor strict birth control laws and widespread abortion, anything that will reduce birthrates. These ideas have filtered into the mainstream. Polls find that prospective Millennial and Gen Z parents are conflicted about bringing children into a world that might be a living hell for their children to endure. Birthrates have fallen in the Western world, while China and Russia are offering incentives for people to marry and have children.
It goes without saying, the anti-humanist ideas are pessimistic, and one wonders if its acolytes are mere depressives or hardcore realists. Transhumanists see the future somewhat differently; they hope to live long enough to a time (two decades is the default prediction) when technology can extend lifespans and cure all diseases. Silicon Valley tycoons are pouring billions into such research. Space travel and colonizing Mars are also part of the plan. There's a strange optimism running through the movement, certain that any human born in 2023 will live a thousand years. In time, a synthesis of artificial intelligence and biology will provide the next step in evolution, imagine the ending of Steven Spielberg's 2001 film A.I:
For transhumanists, the replacement of humanity by a better, more intelligent, more capable successor species is a similarly worthy sacrifice, even if it ends up creating a world in which human beings can no longer find their own reflection. (65)
Kirsch foresees an eventual political alliance between the anti-humanists and transhumanists. They will find common ground on the idea of sacrificing humanity for a better future, one with a reduced number of homo sapiens. They will support policies that reward citizens who have no children and focus resources on reducing carbon emissions. From a geopolitical perspective, countries with high birthrates and dependent on fossil fuels will be considered hostile and may face penalties like draconian economic sanctions.
Kirsch refers to the masses as traditionalists, those who look upon these cultural shifts with disdain and fear. In my days of listening to conspiracy radio, one of the most mentioned ones had to do with reducing the human population by 99%. A belief that secret societies have their own genocidal plan in place to rid themselves of the masses. That's crazy, but it may stem from a sense that many in the educated classes look down on them. Today's politics of resentment are partly fueled by a perceived condescension from technocrats and government bureaucrats. Modern populism carries an animus against educated classes telling them what's best:
The Covid-19 pandemic revealed that millions of people are suspicious of government funded vaccines. How would they react to a government that limited family size or promoted prenatal interventions using GNR technologies? (97)
Those who hold to traditional religious beliefs and cultural values are also turning to "strong men" to spearhead their interests, which will lead to more conflicts, a prediction Kirsch believes Nietzsche predicted in his 1888 work Ecco Homo, "the concept of politics then becomes elevated entirely to the sphere of spiritual warfare." Clashes over historical monuments and gender identity are symptoms of these abstract conflicts of the future.
Left in the dust will be the humanists:
[Their] secular reverence for humanity nurtured two of the greatest inventions of the modern world: liberal democracy, that idea that every human being deserves to participate in self-government, and is capable of doing so, and humanistic culture, in which the purpose of the arts is to explore what it means to be human. Today both of these enterprises are in obvious crisis. (98)
The Revolt Against Humanity shines light and some much-needed context on the undercurrents of today's anxieties about the future. Kirsch points out that projections of what's to come rarely get it right. Despite all the hyperbolic projections of futurists, either messengers of doom or Panglossian prophecies of immortality and virtual reality bliss outs, our day-to-day experiences have their own rhythms and peculiarities. I don't wish for the end of humanity, but I do feel skeptical about its prospects. Extreme positions of either joyfully willing extinction or a hope in magical technologies that will solve everything, I would suggest, will inevitably be moderated, thereby changing the calculus and just maybe walk us away from the cliff of a bad Black Mirror episode.
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