Questions
What Is Transhumanism, and Why Should Christians Care?
Summary: Transhumanism is the philosophical movement that treats human biological limits as problems to be overcome through technology. It deserves Christian attention because its softer, more pervasive forms have already shaped how many Christians think about bodies, aging, dependence, and finitude.
Transhumanism in its strong form envisions transcending the human condition—extending life indefinitely, augmenting cognition, perhaps eventually escaping biological substrate altogether. Its philosophical proponents, such as Nick Bostrom, articulate this as the next stage of evolution: humans should not be the final word. The strong form is easy to spot and easy for most Christians to reject.
The softer forms are harder to name and easier to absorb. They appear whenever we treat aging as failure, dependence as tragedy, or human limits as obstacles rather than features of creaturehood. They appear in fitness culture, anti-aging marketing, the rhetoric around AI as cognitive upgrade, and the casual assumption that medical and technological intervention can ultimately solve mortality. Christians whose anthropology is shaped by Genesis 1-2—finite creatures made for embodied life with God—should recognize that transhumanism, soft or strong, tells a different story about what humans are and what they are for.
Key Takeaways: Transhumanism’s Soft and Strong Forms
- Core Concept: Transhumanism reframes human limits as problems to overcome.
- Scholars: Nick Bostrom (Transhumanist Values); the Transhumanist Manifesto.
- Soft Forms to Watch For: Anti-aging culture, AI as “cognitive upgrade,” dependence framed as failure.
- The “So What”: Christians who absorb soft transhumanism quietly will lose the theological vocabulary for finitude, embodiment, and creaturely dependence.
About the Author — James Spencer, PhD, is a theologian, author, and host of the Thinking Christian podcast, where he writes and speaks on Christian formation, political theology, and technology. He holds a PhD in Theological Studies from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and an MA in Biblical Exegesis from Wheaton College. He serves as president of the D. L. Moody Center in Northfield, Massachusetts, as an Associate Research Fellow at the Kirby Laing Centre for Public Theology, and as adjunct faculty in Wheaton College’s MA in Leadership program. His forthcoming book is Digital Discernment (InterVarsity Press). Learn more at thinkingchristian.org.