The Transhumanist Wager

by Zoltan Istvan

  Jethro responded that America and the A10 had nothing to do with transhumanism anymore, at least not on Transhumania. Once scientists arrived there, he promised hassle-free lives from bossy governments and others that disapprove of transhumanist ways. The United Nations decreed three decades ago that rules and ownership 200 miles away from any land masses on the planet do not exist.

  “Out there on Transhumania, we are under our own stars and navigation,” Jethro declared. “It’s free territory.”

  Additionally, he promised the scientists amazing salaries, stellar healthcare, and citizenship to Transhumania if people desired. For their children, there would be competitive schools, sports groups, piano tutors, French classes, tennis lessons, and swim teams. Dozens of varied restaurants and cafes would serve organic, sustainable, and cruelty-free foods. Coffee shops, juice bars, and drinking pubs would be ubiquitous. Movie theaters, art galleries, fitness centers, libraries, science and technology museums, and shopping centers would dot the city. Innovative designers would set up furniture and clothing outlets, including those that created products and garments with the latest intelligent materials capable of bio-monitoring the body. Whatever you wanted or needed, no matter how far-fetched; it would all be there. Jethro laid out the promise of an ideal, advanced society, the chance to belong to a country with everything going for it.

  His hiring policy was simple. He didn't give a damn where you came from, or what color you were, or with whom you had sex, or what gender you were, or if you had disabilities, or whether you were a criminal or not. But if you were hired for a position, and you failed to meet the goals assigned to you, or if you hindered other hires from meeting the goals assigned to them, then you would be fired and forced off Transhumania at once. There were no labor unions allowed. No workers’ compensation. No welfare. No freebies. In short, there was no pity, or even pretense at pity. There was just usefulness—or not. And if you didn't like it, or didn't agree with it, then you didn't belong on Transhumania. Every contract of every scientist who wanted to join bore this severe language, as well as their consensual agreement to uphold the tenants of the TEF Manifesto and the core mission of transhumanism.

  On a blistering morning in the middle of May, thirty-six tugboats from all over West Africa began pulling Transhumania on its sleds off the beach and into the sea. Over the next night, divers finalized the welding and bolting of the platform's eight independent keels, each one bearing a 40,000 horsepower diesel engine inside it for maneuvering across oceans. The following day, Transhumania was afloat and mobile on its own power.

  So far, photography and the media were strictly disallowed aboard or within five miles of the platform. The sole exception was a cameraman working directly for Jethro, documenting the construction. But weeks after the launch, when the world and the media began confirming rumors of a floating city being built off Africa—via shoddy pictures of the platform appearing on the Internet, taken without permission by cell phones from manual laborers—Jethro scheduled a press conference in Cape Town, South Africa. He planned to announce his transhuman nation to the world and to share images of the seasteading city with the media.

  A week in advance, Jethro began preparing his speech. It was to be an uncompromising swat at the face of the human race, announcing the bold return of transhumanism.

  ************

  “Goddamn it!” cried Senator Gregory Michaelson, two days before the Transhumania press conference. “Where the hell did Jethro Knights get all that money? Did you see the size of that floating thing? That takes lots of money to build.”

  His outburst caught even Reverend Belinas by surprise; the preacher eyed him with hostility. They were having an emergency NFSA meeting in Washington, D.C. Three other senators, two generals, an admiral, a CIA director, Gregory, the preacher, and six top NFSA officials sat around a large, antique maple table overlooking the Potomac River. In the past four months, on orders from the White House, the NFSA had begun the thorny process of downsizing. All major American agencies were going through cuts. The U.S. Government could no longer afford such behemoth operations without prompting a default of its national debt. Besides, the NFSA’s core mission of stamping out the transhumanists had already been trumpeted as an overwhelming success. Many people considered it dated news. The President had publicly announced that federal resources would best be spent elsewhere, like on welfare or Medicaid.

  “I thought this crazy movement was basically over,” Gregory said, looking helplessly at Belinas.

  “Well, it is in America,” spoke up a general. “There are only a handful of renegade scientists left doing anything directly with it.”

  “But they want to—they all want to continue their evil indefinitely,” said Belinas, angrily. “Can you tell us what exactly is being built, Admiral? I can see the satellite photos and what was released to the media, but it’s hard to make out exactly what’s going on. And for what purpose especially?”

  The admiral stood up and walked towards a satellite image screened across a 150-inch monitor on the wall. The picture showed three skyscrapers under construction, rising out of the sea. He pointed to them with a rod, explaining, “We think Mr. Knights is building a brand new city, one that floats and can navigate across oceans. It’s where he and other transhumanists plan to conduct the science they need to overcome human mortality and other transhuman goals. There are no laws once you're 200 miles out to sea, according to the U.N. Convention Act of 1984. Apparently, he’s got someone to foot the bill.”

  “But that takes a lot of money,” Gregory insisted again, his pink silk tie crooked.

  The others glanced at him disdainfully, not caring to point out the obvious.

  The admiral continued, touching the screen on the wall to make the next image appear. The photo showed a massive electrical plant with a grid of thick wires that disappeared into the platform. The following picture showed 125 wind-powered generators near an Olympic-sized swimming pool. Another showed a grain silo on the northeast corner adjacent to a cement factory and a solar farm. The next showed the city’s airport with six commercial jets and eight helicopters lined up on the tarmac. Another showed the inner part of the platform, where sewer systems, walkways, and a subway tube careened around the city. Others showed the half-completed sports stadium where dozens of bulldozers, forklifts, excavators, and cement trucks were parked. One highly zoomed-in photo showed hundreds of tents encircling the docking port on the city’s north side. Thousands of tiny dots—presumably people—were working nearby. The workers’ electric vehicles, which looked like giant bicycle helmets, appeared to be zipping around the platform.

  The admiral went through all the satellite photos—fifty in total—highlighting countless angles of the construction. When he was done speaking, Belinas stood up and placed his clenched fists on the table in front of him.

  “Ladies and gentleman, that city—the so-called transhuman nation—is a menace. It threatens us. We need to stop Jethro Knights and his kind. Our spies say he’s even recruiting our very own scientists to work there—our own American citizens. He's stealing them.”

  The room went silent for many seconds until one of the generals answered. “Now with all due respect, Reverend, it’s hard to see how a bunch of nerdy scientists are going to threaten America. We practically forced them out. It's their right to do what they want outside of our legal jurisdiction. And the rumor is they're leaving because the pay is so good. Hell, when did scientists start making as much money as professional football players? I hear it's almost four times what the best of us make.”

  One of the senators hooted, and said, “Yeah, exactly. I hear they have a million dollar sign-on bonus. A million bucks—cash. In this economic environment. Can you imagine that?”

  “It’s the humanitarian angle with which I'm concerned, people,” Belinas said, interrupting them. “Can't you see that? It's not the damn scientists I care about. It's the grotesque experiments and modifications they plan on doing to the human body, w
hich are fundamentally against our way of life and downright evil. This isn’t about threatening us with a gun, like you’re used to in a war. This is a corrosive gas coming out of the earth when you’re sleeping at night. That’s what the transhumanists are planning, whether they’re in our legal jurisdiction or not.”

  “Well, what do you suggest, Belinas?” asked the other general. “We can’t just attack a group of scientists for doing experiments that technically aren’t illegal outside of our country. And if the rumors are right, these are people who are taking oaths to an autonomous nation with its own laws. There's nothing saying you can't do that. We've always encouraged freedom and allowed that type of civil liberty.”

  “This tyrant, Jethro Knights, knows exactly what he’s doing. He created his own sovereign kingdom so his evil can go unmonitored and unheeded!” Belinas exclaimed.

  The preacher knew he was throwing darts into the dark. The information about Transhumania was still too new and bizarre for anyone but himself to already consider acting on it. “Besides,” he continued, “isn't it treason for our scientists to change teams? Can't you see that damn city is going to be a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah? Something must be done.”

  Gregory interjected loudly, “How the hell do you just start a country? That’s absurd. Aren’t there laws against that?”

  No one paid any attention to him.

  Belinas looked at the admiral and the generals, saying: “What I’m trying to get across to you all is that the President is expecting a report from us. I understand it's not prudent for us to do anything immediately; however, this is an urgent new security threat. And the media is saying perhaps we didn’t win the War on Transhumanism; that maybe we just fanned the fire, wasted the public's money, and scared scientists away in some brain-drain from our nation. We need to prove to the public we did win and will continue winning. I want some ideas from you all in the next weeks on how this rogue city-state can be handled. How it can be contained. How it can be eliminated.”

  ************

  Transhumania’s press conference opened in a prestigious hotel's banquet hall in Cape Town, South Africa. The room was packed with media from all over the world. Janice Mantikas prepped reporters, making it very clear that Jethro Knights would not take any questions either before or after his speech. She even mentioned, quite casually, she wasn't sure if Jethro would ever take questions or do interviews again. Members of the media didn't know how to interpret her statements. Everyone was anxious and edgy, waiting for him to speak. Many journalists had traveled a long way to get the extraordinary story.

  The press only needed one glance at Jethro standing at the speaker's podium to realize they were not dealing with the same man they remembered. He did not welcome the media like he once did in America. He did not make eye contact, smile, or personally greet some of them like he had in the past. He did not care to be engaging or diplomatic anymore. He bore a defiant, determined look on his face; not one of a young man who hoped to change the world, but one of an unyielding leader, bearing enormous resources and power, dedicated only to his mission. He looked like a man who was moments away from letting the world understand just how little he needed or cared about them.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, behind me on the screen is a picture of Transhumania, the seasteading transhuman nation where scientists, technologists, and futurists carry out research they believe is their moral right and in the best interest of themselves. We are on our way towards attaining unending sentience and the most advanced forms of ourselves that we can reach, which is the essence of the transhuman mission. Of course, you’ve already figured that out—so let me just get to the point.

  “In this room here today, and all around the world, many people are asking similar questions: Are Jethro Knights and other Transhumanians traitors to their home countries? Are they betraying the human race and its sense of a shared, universal humanity? Are they renegade atheists and blasphemers of a higher power such as an omnipotent God?”

  Jethro stood taller and scanned the room. His face bore the unsentimental expression of an executioner at work.

  “Here is the answer—and know that I speak for every person who has been, and will become, a citizen of Transhumania. The answer is: We don’t give a damn.

  “People of the world, do not mistake us any longer as citizens of your countries, or as participants in your societies, or as people who would consider your gods, religions, histories, and cultures as something important. We are not those things. Nor are we willing to accept others' ideas of power and control over us anymore. Nor do we give a damn about your opinions, your social idiosyncrasies, your glam media, your hypocritical laws, your failing economies, or your lives—unless you can offer us something in return to make us give a damn.

  “In the past, we may have appeared to belong to your conformist concept of the human race; we may have looked like you, dressed like you, and even talked like you. We may have watched television shows like you, commuted in traffic to get to work like you, paid our taxes like you. But should anything—and I mean anything—become not useful for us, then we will quit that thing. We will quit the world—quit our allegiance to its powers, quit our sense of value to it, and quit our respect for its people. For all who know me and my colleagues who will be moving to Transhumania—we did quit.

  “A planet’s nations and its people whom we live amongst are beholden to us. And not us to it. On Transhumania, we are all one-person universes, one-person existences, one-person cultures. Bearing that in mind, we may still live or die for one another: for our families, for our children, for our spouses, for our friends, for our colleagues at Transhumania—or for those whom we respect and for whom we care to reasonably live or die. We will not live or die for someone we don’t know, however. Or for someone we don't respect. Or for someone or something we don't value. We will not throw away years of our lives for uneducated consumers, for welfare-collecting non-producers, for fool religious fanatics, or for corrupt politicians who know law but don’t stand by it or practice it.

  “Some of you out there have the insolence and the idiocy to call us traitors to our birth countries, or lost souls of an invincible God, or betrayers of civil society. Your fool mantra is: Don’t ask what your society, planet, or God can do for you—but ask what you can do for your society, planet, or God. What nonsense to a teleological egocentric functionalist, to a transhumanist whose goal is to live forever, and needs to acquire power to establish and protect that superlative goal.

  “Your preachers, politicians, educators, and cohorts have lied to you for so long, from the day of your birth onward. They have conditioned you to obey and follow the status quo of your long-standing societies and its mores, tricking you into believing that by remaining one of them you are following the best, most righteous path. But it is not the best, most righteous path—it’s an ignorant fool’s path. It's one that leads to death, and also one that leads to overall mediocrity and a personal state of reduced power. I implore each of you to leave that fraudulent path behind, to revolt against it, to think totally for yourself, to strive for your individual power, to embrace transhumanism and our inevitable evolution as a transcendent species.

  “But if you are not with us, and if you choose to be against us, then you are of no positive value to us. You are a blatant hindrance. We won't care to protect you, or to respect you, or to share our genius, science, and power with you. Or even to pretend anything for you. We will have no system of honor to offer you, no system of fair play to present to you, no system of moral pity with which to save you. We will see you as zero value, if that even. And we are not afraid to understand that exact thing, to say it out loud to your faces, to live confidently knowing it. And more importantly, we are not afraid to act upon it.

  “We are transhumanists who are all searching for the greatest power ever imagined, the greatest power we can attain in ourselves, the might of the omnipotender. Transhumania is our new home. We will continue to build and expand this budding
sovereign nation with our own hands, using the passion of our spirit, led by the rationality of our minds. We will form a magnificent stronghold you cannot tear down. And if you try to stop us, we will fight you—and we will defeat you. We will kill you if we have to. If needed, we will kill every one of you, down to the last enemy of transhumanism on this planet. We will eliminate you into the void of the universe with no remorse, with the same cold morality a machine would use. We are through playing by your rules and on your terms.

  “However, for those who are our allies—who think like us, who act like us, and who are useful to us—we will invite you to join us: as friends, as colleagues, as comrades. And we will trade value to each other to gain what we want. We will discriminate against and judge each other on the basis of whether we offer sufficient utility to one another or not. There's only one quintessential rule on Transhumania: If you don't add value to the transhuman mission, if you are inconsequential or a negative sum to our success, then you will be forced off and away from our nation. The people on Transhumania are only beholden to that. We offer exile as the greatest punishment known to humankind. Because what you are exiled from—the eventual possibility of your immortality and a chance at your omnipotent self—no ego, no money, no birthright, no political office, no force on Earth or in the universe can grant you. If you fail us—if you fail the transhuman mission—then you fail the very best in yourself.