Criticism of Vulgar “Posthumanism” Which Nullifies Human and Fantasizes Nonexistent Future

* To avoid ambiguity, Braidotti and Hayles are referred to by their initial alphabets, B and H, respectively.

Endangered Humanism?

As Braidotti discovers that “Humanistic studies have been downgraded beyond the ‘soft’ sciences level” (B10), contemporary academia seems to have a clear preference for techno-scientific disciplines over humanistic-liberal fields. From the number of faculty members to the amount of financial support, the qualitative methodology seems to gradually lose its autonomous position. Why did this happen? Is human, not human anymore? Braidotti and Hayles point out and criticize both the ontological and epistemological bases of Western thought tradition, “Humanism”, whose agent is assumed to be “vital, self-organizing and non-naturalistic” (B2) and is “deal[ing] with the outside world solely by rational argument.” (Hxii) This tendency of disregarding bodiness and praising information urged people to demystify humanity and bestow it on non-humans, such as artificial humans, dwellers of meta-verse, animals, avatars, Siri.

This compulsively nihilistic viewpoint, especially widespread in contemporary social criticism and journalism, evokes both excitement and terror. Are we identical to Siri, and will humanity fight with empty hands against the robotic, cyborg army? Surely these imaginations are nice ingredients for popular science-fiction narratives, but does it contain any theoretical productivity? In other words, does it truly reflect the modern cybernetic culture, and rightly forecast the future? Firstly, does Hayles really insist on this kind of vulgar “Anti-humanism”? In my opinion, unfortunately for SF writers, no. Throughout the introduction of her book, she emphasizes “ideas in a constellation,” (H15) “understanding ourselves as embodied creatures” (H24), and “smoothing the transition.” (H17) She carefully constructs the text to avoid the simple human-nonhuman dichotomy. According to Hayles, all agents are not exclusively human or nonhuman but contain both virtues within a spectral continuum. Therefore, we also can be, or are already, “posthumans” to some extent.

The Human Revival

Then why are many classical humanitarian departments so eager to remain alive and express hostility against “Posthuman”, though somewhat sarcastically and indirectly? I think this theoretical allergy can be interpreted as a Freudian melancholic response to Barthesian “Death of the Author” on humanity. As Foucault strongly criticizes, naïve erasure of any conceptual term actually revives it as a mysterious “absence.” Theorists who want to be involved in the technoscientific discourse but are not that interested in numerical mechanisms respond weirdly to fading-out humanism. Shocked by the revisionary movements toward Humanity, they project their lost libido by self-killing the concept Human preemptively. This attitude accumulates nothing but helplessness and ignorance. By seeing entirely capitalistic products as neutral non-humans, they make themselves doubly blind to front-line advancements and burning problems.

Then what should we do? Even though Hayles tries to unveil the heterogeneity and continuity of humanness and posthumanness, her “neutral” position is overly vulnerable to vulgar anti-humanism. I think we should see the state-of-the-art products of modern technology as literally manmade “art,” therefore reflecting Human-ness, by not supposing any mysteriously objectified “other” agents such as cyborgs or “artificial” agents. Of course, this discourse needs familiarity with technical jargon, but any effective correction is possible only in this way. Science and Technology Studies (STS), led by Latour or Haraway (who are quoted in Hayles), is struggling now to drag Posthumanism out of the abyss of posthumous Humanism.