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The future of immortality : remaking life and death in contemporary Russia / Anya Bernstein.
LIBRA BT921.3 .B47 2019
Available from offsite location
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Bernstein, Anya, author.
- Series:
- Princeton studies in culture and technology
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Immortality.
- Future, The.
- Aging--Physiological aspects.
- Aging.
- Death.
- Human body.
- Anthropology--Russia (Federation).
- Anthropology.
- Russia (Federation).
- Science--Russia (Federation).
- Science.
- Physical Description:
- xv, 270 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.
- Place of Publication:
- Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, [2019]
- Summary:
- As long as we have known death, we have dreamed of life without end. In The Future of Immortality, Anya Bernstein explores the contemporary Russian communities of visionaries and utopians who are pressing at the very limits of the human. The Future of Immortality profiles a diverse cast of characters, from the owners of a small cryonics outfit to scientists inaugurating the field of biogerontology, from grassroots neurotech enthusiasts to believers in the Cosmist ideas of the Russian Orthodox thinker Nikolai Fedorov. Bernstein puts their debates and polemics in the context of a long history of immortalist thought in Russia, with global implications that reach to Silicon Valley and beyond. If aging is a curable disease, do we have a moral obligation to end the suffering it causes? Could immortality be the foundation of a truly liberated utopian society extending beyond the confines of the earth--something that Russians, historically, have pondered more than most? If life without end requires radical genetic modification or separating consciousness from our biological selves, how does that affect what it means to be human? As vividly written as any novel, The Future of Immortality is a fascinating account of techno-scientific and religious futurism - and the ways in which it hopes to transform our very being.
- Contents:
- The Limits of Time and Space p. 6
- Futurism as a Politics of Time p. 11
- The Future as the Common Cause p. 15
- Trans- or Posthuman? A Brief Guide p. 19
- Mortals of the World, Unite! p. 22
- The Return of the Progressors p. 29
- 1 Freeze, Die, Come to Life: The Many Paths to Immortality p. 35
- KrioRus: Bodies in the Deep Freeze p. 41
- The Avatar Project p. 49
- Kinship, Resurrection, and Physiological Collectivism p. 59
- Producing the Post-Soviet Human p. 71
- Beyond the Sovereign Self p. 76
- Our Body Must Become Our Cause, the Common Cause To Bury Is to Preserve p. 81
- Smertobozhnichestvo: Apotheosis of Death p. 90
- A Body Was Given to Me-What Do I Do with It? p. 97
- The Spirit of Dialectics p. 109
- 3 Ending Death by Disease: The "War on Aging" p. 124
- "Homo Sapiens Liberatus" p. 126
- Optimistic Biology p. 135
- The Future of Aging: Four Scenarios p. 144
- Is Aging a Disease? p. 146
- Science, Business, and Hope p. 152
- A New National Idea p. 161
- 4 Inside NeuroNet p. 165
- Chips and Mind Melds p. 169
- Foresight: Reengineering Futures p. 178
- The Future Must Be Created p. 180
- NeuroNet: A New Space Race? p. 187
- The Nods and the Cosmos p. 191
- Virtually Immortal p. 201.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-254) and index.
- Local Notes:
- Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Class of 1932 Fund.
- ISBN:
- 0691182612
- 9780691182612
- 0691182604
- 9780691182605
- OCLC:
- 1059261349
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