August 9, 2017 Show with David Herbert on “Becoming God: Transhumanism & the Quest For Cybernetic Immortality”

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister

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George Norcross in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Now here's our host, Chris Arnson. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming.

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This is Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this ninth day of August 2017, and today we have both a first -time guest and a first -time topic.

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Today we're going to be discussing transhumanism, and according to the publisher of the book that our guest today has written, transhumanism is a growing philosophical movement among leading business leaders, scientists, artists, politicians and futurists.

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They believe that the future of humanity lives in a post -human world.

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In the book Becoming God, David Herbert, our guest today, traces the philosophic and scientific roots of this movement through the changes brought with the

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Enlightenment, the Victorian era, religious humanism and secular humanism leading to the rise of transhumanism, profiling the key world figures in this movement,

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Ray Kurzweil, Aubrey de Grey, Kevin Warwick, Natasha Vida -Moore,

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Nigel Ackland and others. He explores their views, both common and unique, on aspects of transhumanist philosophy, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron, David Herbert.

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Oh, listen, well, thank you very much. I consider it a real privilege to be part of your program. And I consider it a privilege to have you on the program, and in studio with me is my co -host, the

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Reverend Buzz Taylor. Hello once again, sounds like an interesting subject. Yeah, I thought this would interest

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Buzz because this is either life imitating science fiction or science fiction imitating life,

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I'm not really sure which. Really? But my co -host is quite a science fiction, um, what's the word

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I'm looking for? Devotee? Enthusiast? I wouldn't go quite that far. I do like it. Yeah, well, those are obviously from our conversations, your favorite movies.

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Yeah. Oh, yeah. But anyway, the this is quite a remarkable subject that is quite bizarre and quite frightening and quite disturbing, actually.

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But it's something that I think our listeners should know about. Before we even get into the subject and about the book,

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I want to know something about you, Dr. Herbert. Whenever I have a first -time guest, I typically like to get an idea of the religious atmosphere they were raised in, if any, and what providential circumstances arose in your life that the

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Lord used to draw you to himself and save you. Well, I didn't grow up in a

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Christian home. My mother married a non -Christian, and the

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Bible was never read in our home. But my mother, what she did was she made sure that my two sisters and myself went to Sunday school.

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And it was through the, really, the faithful teaching of Sunday school teachers that I, at a fairly young age, came to know the

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Lord Jesus Christ. And now, mind you, through my growing up in a non -Christian home, of course, we always have the sort of turbulent teenage years, but I would say by the time

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I was 20 and I was starting teaching then, that the Lord really, really became really precious and really first in my life.

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And from that time on, through, you know, through education and teaching, the

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Lord became very, very precious in my life. Well, praise

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God. And I know that you were, or should

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I say are, a retired teacher. I know you're a graduate of London Teachers College.

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And I know that you've gotten your BA from the University of Western Toronto. No, Western Ontario. Oh, I'm sorry,

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Western Ontario. And your MA from Wheaton College here in the United States, and your Master of Divinity degree from Heritage Theological Seminary, and your

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MED and your EDD from the University of Toronto. That's where the confusion came in.

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And you've written on at least four books in the study of origins and Darwinism.

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When in your life did this fascination arise in regard to origins, in regard to refuting the unbiblical and even unscientific theories of Darwin?

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Right. Actually, I'm just finishing my, today, I saw the publisher yesterday, worked on my 14th book.

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Wow. And so, where it really started was, I started my teaching career as an elementary school teacher.

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And one of my desires was to move to the secondary school. And throughout my teaching career,

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I taught from grade five to 13. At that time, we, our university, we just for three years, of course, today it's four, but at that time we had grade 13.

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And so, when I moved from the elementary up to secondary, one of the courses, when

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I was in my fourth year at University of Toronto, I took Greek and Roman history. And so, what

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I had a chance to teach was, that time was a grade 11 course on ancient history. The first topic that we had to deal with was the origin of mankind.

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And, you know, with tongue -in -cheek, I say that we never got past that question, but this is where it began and became a passion for me.

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How do I teach both evolutionism, and I stress that, evolutionism and creationism in the public system?

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And this is where it started. And from that, it just blossomed.

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And I've had an opportunity to speak in my high schools at the university, and out of that developed a number of books dealing with the question of origin.

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Well, this is a subject that we are discussing today that I think a lot of our listeners might be totally unfamiliar with, as far as it being an actual phenomenon, an actual goal of real scientists and so forth, rather than just something that is the theme of science fiction movies.

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Tell us something about, or define, if you could, what transhumanism is.

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Okay. I think it's the greatest threat to our church. Wow. And the reason why

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I'm saying that is that, when you think in terms of transhumanism, again, it's really, starts with, it's a philosophy, it's international philosophy, and the whole goal of transhumanism is how do we conquer death?

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Now, the people, and as you mentioned in the introduction, these people, and they're really, many of them now are in Silicon Valley, and one of the leading organizations is

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Google. The two founders of Google, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, are both committed transhumanists.

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And, of course, another sort of side issue, or maybe I shouldn't say side issue, an important issue, is that transhumanists are atheists, and their fear of a goal is how can we circumvent death?

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And so they have seen, and of course we have the escalation of technology, how it's moving forth.

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I mean, just in the last decade, just think in terms of the growth of computerization, they're growing, what, smaller, faster, and cheaper.

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And so they see that, and they have a date, 2045, when they see that the technology would be so much advanced that we can merge technology with humanity and become

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God. Wow. And another thing I can mention, when you think in terms of the proliferation of cell phones, and how important they are in lives,

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I read a book called Eye Disorder, think of IMAC, Eye Disorder, and in the book it said that people, what, no longer than 15 minutes can they be away from their technology.

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And I was talking to a girl going down the elevator, and she said, that's not true. She said, I take this thing to bed with me.

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And so there's a real, almost, I would say it's almost an addiction between the technology, and it goes beyond all ages.

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And so it's a powerful force in our society.

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Now, this line that you used about the scientists, the atheists in Silicon Valley, having a goal to become

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God, I mean, is that your way of categorizing it, or do they actually describe it that way themselves? Well, in my book there with Ray Kurzweil, let me just get a paper here, there was a movie put out concerning the life of Ray Kurzweil, Life and Time, and he finished the book.

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Here's his quote. The universe will wake up. It will become intelligent.

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That will multiply our intelligence trillions upon trillions. It'll be called the singularity.

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But regardless what you call it, it'll be universe waking up. Does God exist?

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Not yet. Not yet. There you go. Well, most of our,

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I shouldn't even say that most of our listeners would remember the six million dollar man, perhaps most of them wouldn't.

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Depends on what I never took a poll on the age groups that listen to my show. But if you're at least 50 or 55 as I am, you would remember the six million dollar man.

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And I see nothing at all wrong with the technology that is helping to restore the lives of, for instance, disabled veterans, veterans who come home and they are missing limbs and all kinds of things.

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And I rejoice in the technology that God has provided for mankind, the intelligence that he has granted certain people to develop this technology to help enable disabled people to live normal lives, self -sufficient lives, and so on.

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Where would the concept of what I'm speaking of part company with what you are describing with transhumanism?

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Yeah, and I would certainly agree with you. I think in terms of people have Parkinson's and we have deep brain stimulation where they put a probe in a person's head and it controls the tremors.

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And like you, I think that's commendable. But it's the philosophy behind it.

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You see, for example, when you think in terms of a transhumanist, first of all, he says there's no

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God. And when he looks at you and he looks at me, he sees nothing more than just information.

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I think back in terms of the mapping of the human genome.

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Now, we've done that. And the last frontier, of course, is our mind. And so what you have, there's no spiritual dimension in you at all.

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And so if we're just sort of the collection of information as they see it, then why shouldn't we be able to take that information and put it into some sort of computerized substrate?

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And so it's really the division comes, as it always does, is what is the people's theology?

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That's what it is. And what you're saying before, I agree with. I mean, we can help individuals and make their lives better and make them more useful.

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That's one thing. But their philosophy is driving them to a point because they want to.

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The whole goal is how can I circumvent death and become God? And I'm assuming you would also believe that other than those that are actually identifying themselves with an ideology of transhumanism, there may be

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Christians involved in the field of medicine and the field of computer technology and all the fields that would be involved in enabling disabled people to live self -sufficient normal lives.

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I'm assuming that you would believe that a Christian could, without any troubled conscience, be involved in that spectrum of technology.

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Well, I was doing a presentation, this is to some young people, and the book that you have,

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Becoming God, I was very, very dependent on computers. And the thing is, what's controlling what?

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I mean, I control the computer. But I think, as I mentioned before, now we're in a situation where I believe the technology is controlling us or the people.

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And so that's where the, I mean, I'm certainly, I have a computer and I thank the

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Lord that it's a tremendous tool. But I control it, it doesn't control me. I'm kind of getting a flashback from the movie, the 1970s movie

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Westworld. Did you ever see Westworld? No, I haven't. Oh, really? No. Well, it's basically about a futuristic amusement park where the robots look exactly like real human beings.

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And one of the three amusement parks in this futuristic theme park was

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Westworld, where it was the whole amusement park in that section of the theme park was the

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Wild West, and there were cowboys shooting each other, and their guns had some kind of sensor where they could never even accidentally shoot a real human being.

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And there was a computer glitch where the robots were hunting down all the humans in the movie and killing them because all these safeguards that were built into the system had gone awry.

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So anyway, I would suggest that you watch the movie. Well, okay.

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But as I said, I don't have a television, but I'm sure you could find it on YouTube somewhere.

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I'm trying to figure out here since we're talking about technology and movies and becoming God and all that.

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I'm trying to figure out which movies we're talking about really. So I mean, you're talking about like artificial intelligence also, right?

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Or are you talking about just the human mind developing to Godhood? Well, I think those things are like artificial intelligence is really part of the whole thing.

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I mean, as I mentioned before, the whole goal is to get you into some type of computer substrate.

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And this to me is artificial intelligence. And the whole idea of, you know, as Ray Kurzweil was saying there,

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I mean, they see it as one way of enhancing our intelligence, our capabilities, like in the case of Natasha Vita -Moore.

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I mean, she's gone through and has called Primal Post.

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And she's already, she's into graphic arts and this type of thing. And so she's already mapped out this person and, you know, all the human capabilities and strengths that we have and the increase in our heart rate and so on.

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And so for them, I mean, they want to get into this post -human world because they feel now that they will have, they'll enhance all our capabilities.

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Well, I want to read an endorsement for your book by a guest that I have had on this program a number of times.

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He's one of my favorite guests, Jerry Bergman. Oh yes, I know Jerry. Professor and author of Hitler and the

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Nazi Darwinian Worldview and a number of other books. Jerry says, Transhumanism is an international cultural movement that has as its goal the radical transformation of humanity by the development of technologies that greatly enhance the intellectual, physical and psychological capacities of humans.

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While a laudable goal and one that has attracted many supporters from a wide range of perspectives, its roots and fruits lend credence to the objections of Stanford University Professor Francis Fukuyama.

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I don't know how to pronounce that, Fukuyama. He ranks the idea as among the most dangerous in history.

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Although biologist Julian Huxley is regarded as the founder of the philosophy, basic transhumanist ideas were first articulated by British evolutionist

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J .B .S. Haldane. Haldane supported the now infamous philosophy of eugenics, the application of genetics to improve humanity, which led to among other things, the

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Nazi Holocaust. In Becoming God, Herbert explores the goals of the transhumanist movement and documents the reasons why it is so dangerous and threatens the values of free society.

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Dr. Herbert is a careful and thorough researcher and has written a valuable book that both informs and analyzes this growing movement.

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And as I said, that was Dr. Jerry Bergman, a frequent guest on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. And by the way,

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I don't know if you're aware of this, Dr. Herbert, and actually there's no reason why you would be already aware of this, but I lived about 20 minutes away, the hometown that I grew up in Amityville, Long Island, New York, and I only moved away from Long Island in 2015, but I only lived about 20 minutes away from the

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Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories, which was the headquarters of eugenics in the

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United States prior to that no longer being a facet of that laboratory.

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Yeah. Oh, no. And of course, we in Canada, there was, you know, post -World War II and up to World War II.

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No, post -World War I up to World War II. I mean, a lot of this eugenics was going on in Canada too. Well, let's go back to the, trace this to the very roots.

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Let's go back to the Enlightenment and discuss how this has its roots even in the

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Enlightenment. Well, of course, there's an interesting quote in the book by Roy Porter, and I like what his quote, let me just get it right here.

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He talks about us being the children of the Enlightenment, and he goes on, he said, we should get to know our parents.

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And really, when you think in terms of the Enlightenment, the whole goal of the Enlightenment, or better still, the age of reason, is that everything has to be compatible to reason.

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And of course, this goes back to the 17th, 18th century when the Enlightenment was really burgeoning forth.

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And of course, it became a worldwide, I mean, you think in terms of, moved up into Scotland and certainly in the

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United States, when you think in terms of the Declaration of Independence, many of those of your fathers were very supporters of the

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Enlightenment and Enlightenment thinking. And so it's really the importance of reason.

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Now, what is really interesting historically is that prior to the Enlightenment, when you think in terms of the three eternal questions, where did it come from, why am

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I here, where am I going? Revelation, the Bible, was the answer. But when we went through the

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Enlightenment, again, the Bible was supplanted by reason, and reason became the answer, what became the driving force in answering those three questions.

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And certainly it grew in intensity. And of course, here we are in the 21st century, and the scriptures have been totally marginalized, and everything has to be compatible with reason.

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By the way, I have two of those questions that are a bit altered that I ask my co -host,

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Reverend Buzz Taylor, every day. Why are you here and when are you going? I hope he gives a biblical answer.

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But anyway, well, let's move on from there to the

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Victorian era, which is the 19th century. Yeah, well, when you think in terms of the, again, going back to the sort of the foundation, you see, for example, as we're moving into the

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Victorian era, there's the growth of biblical, what, well, the discrediting of the

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Bible. I think of David Strauss in his book on the life of Jesus. And so we have the whole movement to discredit the

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Bible as being a credible source. And of course, along with that, as we're coming along, so we have the rise of reason and certainly the growth of humanism.

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Of course, the two go hand in hand where man becomes sort of the supremacy. And along with that, of course, is developing evolutionism.

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And of course, these are going to be two streams that are going to run hand in hand, one supporting the other, moving up to really the emergence of transhumanism, which will be both the 1990s.

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So out of the 19th century, you have coming those two streams, humanism and evolutionism running side by side.

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Yes. And I understand that a lot of the racist ideas of eugenics, since they had their root at its root in the 19th century, a lot of that really arose to have popularity amongst the liberal elite, or at least the elite in general, the racist elite, was because of the fact that slavery had become outlawed in the

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United States, the Civil War was over, and you had a lot of elitist whites who were looking for a solution to the fact that the

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North American continent had been a lot of freed slaves that they were worried about.

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They were worried about what these slaves would now do, now that they had more freedom and power in their hands. So they developed all these evil ideas, which eventually led to Margaret Sanger in the early 20th century, starting what is now known as Planned Parenthood.

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And a lot of people still don't realize that Planned Parenthood's main goal was to sterilize those of non -white backgrounds, non -white races, although I believe there's only one race, the human race, but to use their language, so that the population would basically eventually just die off.

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And of course, then Planned Parenthood, when abortion became legal, they became the masters of the infanticide mill.

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But if you could comment on that whole progression there. Yeah, although I think in terms of Darwin's book of 1859,

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I mean, the whole thing was based on the fact that at the sort of human development was what, an educated

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Englishman, which Darwin saw himself as. And of course, when he came back from Tierra del

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Fuego at the, of course, the end of South America, I mean, he saw those people.

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And again, he saw that, as I said here, here's people who just moved out of the trees.

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And of course, he saw himself, especially an English scholar, at the pinnacle.

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And so, yeah, certainly the racist ideas were part and parcel of Darwinism.

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There's no doubt about it. Well, we're going to go to a break right now. If anybody would like to join us for the question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

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C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

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Please give us at least your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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USA. If this is about a personal and private matter, you can remain anonymous.

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But if this is not about a personal and private matter, please at least give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence.

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And before we go to the break, I will read you a question and then you could answer it when we return.

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Daniel in San Jose, California is our first questioner. Can you ask Dr. Herbert to briefly explain the shift hundreds of years ago from the

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Christian world view to deism, naturalism, and so on, to the postmodern view?

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That is the first of a couple of questions he asked. In fact, I will email you.

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I will forward you Daniel's email so you will have all of his questions in front of you and you can mill them over during our station break, if that's all right with you.

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And once again, if anybody else would like to join us, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

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chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back, God willing, after these messages from our sponsors.

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34:02

Welcome back. This is Chris Orensen, if you just tuned us in. Our guest today for the full two hours, with 90 minutes to go, is

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Dr. David Herbert, graduate of London Teachers College, having earned his B .A.

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from the University of Western Ontario, his M .A. from Wheaton College, his

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Master of Divinity from Heritage Theological Seminary, and his M .E .D. and E .D

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.D. from the University of Toronto, and he's the author of a number of books on origins and Darwinism.

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We are discussing his book Becoming God, Transhumanism, and the Quest for Cybernetic Immortality.

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If you'd like to join us on the air for the question of your own, our email address is chrisorensen at gmail dot com. chrisorensen at gmail dot com.

34:45

And as you know, Dr. Herbert, before the break, I read one of a couple of questions, or three questions, submitted by Daniel in San Jose, California, the first of which is, can you ask

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Dr. Herbert to briefly explain the shift, hundreds of years ago, from the Christian worldview of deism, naturalism, and so on, to the post -modern worldview?

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Yeah, I have it on my computer here, too. Yeah, I think, as I mentioned before, when you think in terms of a worldview, and again,

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I think of those three eternal questions, but a worldview, as you go through, say, for example, the 18th, 19th century, up to the 20th century, as I think

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I mentioned before, is that the understanding of those three questions, and how we answer them, prior to the period of enlightenment, the final source, the authority, was the

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Bible. But when we went through the Enlightenment, the Bible was replaced by reason.

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And as you mentioned right here, for example, there's a progression here. You go deism,

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I would say humanism. And so, as we try to answer those three questions, when the

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Bible was pushed aside, and of course, as we moved right up to the 21st century, we live in a time now where Christianity has been totally marginalized.

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And so, in answering those questions, we depend on reason. Now, of course, it can be, whether it's deism, naturalism, or post -modernism, the foundation of all those is reason.

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And Daniel in San Jose, California, also asks how that ties into transhumanism.

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And also, can you explain how Christians can properly understand transhumanism, so as to accurately represent it when we engage with those who hold that view, and proclaim to them the gospel?

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Yeah, that last question, I really appreciate it. In my book, and for the last 12 and a half years, we have questionnaires.

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And in the appendix of my book, we had what's called a transhumanist questionnaire.

37:01

And we interviewed 800 people. This is one -on -one. And within, there were three questions.

37:10

And one was dealing with transhumanism. We asked people if they had the opportunity of having a chip put into the center of their head that would allow them to be, what, more intelligent.

37:28

And again, these were dealing with, some of them were students. Would they do it? And we got a variety of answers.

37:36

But the last question deals with death. And we had options.

37:43

I'll give the options that we had in the questions here.

37:49

We'd ask them, if you die, would you go to heaven, heaven or hell, cessation of existence, you don't know, and the other option.

38:00

And with that question, there, we had an opportunity to share the gospel.

38:05

And that was certainly one of the highlights. And as I said, we just finished another book on Islam and Christianity, and we're up over 600 people.

38:17

So the questionnaire has been a wonderful tool in my writing to share the gospel.

38:25

Well, Daniel, you have won a free copy of the book that we are addressing today,

38:32

Becoming God, Transhumanism and the Quest for Cybernetic Immortality by our guest

38:38

David Herbert. Thank you very much for contributing excellent questions to the program.

38:44

Keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron and spreading the word about the program in San Jose, California and beyond.

38:52

And the next question we have is from Rose in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

39:02

And Rose, I have to enlarge her question because the font is so small.

39:09

Transhumanism amazing, the search to overcome death all the while they are killing new life in the womb by the hundreds, if not the thousands, actually millions.

39:19

By the day, does this not drip with irony? This is more of a comment than a question, but leads to a very, very important ironic element of this whole discussion.

39:33

There are a lot of ironic elements that are arising day by day within leftism.

39:40

For instance, not that this is a part of our discussion today, but you have leftists wanting public bathrooms to be available to anyone regardless of their gender.

39:53

And now you actually have feminists who are part of the leftist movement who realize that's insane, because the feminists have for decades viewed men as predators, sexual predators, if not all men, or the majority of them.

40:08

And they see how this is insane to be permitting men to be strolling into the restrooms where they are desiring or needing privacy.

40:18

But what she says about abortion going on, and you have simultaneously this quest for eternal life physically, it is quite an ironic thing, isn't it?

40:31

Well, you see, for example, in Canada, we're way ahead of you people. Yes, I hear.

40:37

I mean, for example, we have legislation, which was what I think was in 2006, that we passed legislation that men couldn't, you know, marry men.

40:46

And as far as the transhumanist gender, we are way ahead. For example, in high schools, we might have three washrooms.

40:53

And we, for example, our prime minister, we had that pride parade, and I don't think they had over a million people in Toronto, and leading the parade was our prime minister.

41:06

Wow. So I mean, you've got some catching up to do. But the unfortunate part, as I look across the border,

41:15

I think you're going on the same, you're on the same wagon we're on. Yeah. Yeah, it is quite tragic.

41:23

Do the architects of this, this movement, do they have any response to the question of abortion at all?

41:36

I mean, are they a mixed group? Are there any pro -lifers among them, ironically? Or are they, from what you understand, are they all pro -death or pro -choice?

41:45

It was interesting that even the atheist Christopher Hitchens became pro -life. But if you could comment on that.

41:54

I'm not too sure. Are you saying, for example, are the, for example, the abortionists and so on, that they are part of the transhumanist movement?

42:02

Is that the question? Or are there any pro -lifers among them as well, amongst the transhumanists, if they even discuss it or mention it?

42:11

I'm not even sure. Yeah, well, I think right now, as I mentioned before, this is sort of an elitist, you know, basically in academia.

42:20

And of course, as I said right from the beginning, when you think in terms of Silicon Valley, whether it's

42:27

Mark Zuckerman or, for example, the founders of Google and Peter Thiel and so on,

42:35

I mean, these are the people that are being the driving force. But I think it's, as I could see it,

42:42

I would say the average person, and this including the church too, we have no idea what transhumanism is about.

42:50

That's why, for example, like the sale of the book, most people, they confuse what sort of transgender and transhumanist.

43:03

So, as I said, it's a greater threat, but there's a greater, there's very little understanding of the power behind this.

43:12

And if you get the internet and Google, I mean, their whole goal is, for example, to conquer death.

43:20

And you and I both know the power of Google, whether it's within the government or certainly we think in terms of the control of the internet, they're a powerful force.

43:35

But I would say the average person in the street or in the pews really know very little about transhumanism.

43:42

Now, there is an interesting thing going on here that's also a tension between conflicting ideas.

43:51

If most in the transhumanist society would be leftist and they are on a quest for immortality, for achieving immortality for humans, leftists are also pretty much leading the charge against overpopulation, which is why they're in favor of abortion and so on, why they're in favor of euthanasia.

44:20

There seems to be a conflicting interest here. Do they expect procreation to come to a halt at some point with this technology?

44:30

Yes. Oh, they do. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, that's right. I mean, for example, when you become sort of a computerized substrate, then as far as I suppose sexual activity,

44:44

I would think that would come to an end. So they actually expect the human aspects of cybernetic beings to be diminished and in fact, perhaps even nearly entirely erased?

44:57

Right. I would think so. Again, we're looking down in the future and they are to the future.

45:05

But my understanding of that would be, I mean, for example, you'll become more artificial intelligence and less human and their goal would be to finally merge the humanity with technology and then just do away with our whole sense of humanity.

45:29

So as far as the concept of people, and of course, they think they're going to control the whole universe.

45:38

So I mean, they're not as far as space is concerned, that's not a concern with them. Of course,

45:44

I could mention one thing. Of course, some people have been very critical of them is that since it's an elitist organization, is this technology going to be available for say, people in Afghanistan, or for example, in the heart of Africa, or just basically a very elitist, and for those who have money and are in a position of prominence.

46:11

Very good point. Well, let's now move on to both religious and secular humanism, if you could approach those two areas of humanity when it comes to transhumanism's rise.

46:25

Yeah, well, for example, what I did, Chris, was I used the Humanist Manifesto of 1933 as sort of the first step.

46:38

And again, it's a very, very important document. What is interesting is there were 34 people who signed it, and John Dewey was one of them.

46:50

And, but it was a recognition of, as I said in that book, being religious without God.

46:57

In the Humanist Manifesto of 1933, they recognized what they saw as the importance of religion, but there is no

47:07

God. But they wanted to, for example, have a society which is no good, but God was to be eliminated from it.

47:18

And then, of course, you move along to the secular humanism, and a person named

47:24

Paul Kurtz, he really became the father of the whole question of secular humanism.

47:32

Yes, I remember him on the John Ankerberg program years ago. I think he even debated

47:39

Walter Martin, if I'm not mistaken, or one of the the apologists on the panel that John Ankerberg had on his program.

47:47

Absolutely. Now, of course, you see, we've got a progression here. We've got being religious without God.

47:54

Of course, that's religious humanism. Now, with secular humanism is being good without God and religion.

48:02

And so the thing now, in the case of Paul Kurtz, and he was a very, very effective man.

48:08

I mean, you think in terms he taught at the state university in New York at Buffalo.

48:16

He taught philosophy. He started a book company called Prometheus.

48:22

And I think the last time I heard, four or five thousand books they're putting out, but they're all atheistic.

48:29

I mean,

48:37

Humanist Manifesto 2, which is 1973. And of course, so you have the two of them.

48:45

And now, as we move up into the 1990s, moving up to the, what, transhumanism, you see, the transhumanists, they really wanted to separate themselves from secular humanism.

49:04

First of all, they felt that why are we concerned?

49:09

And certainly, when you think in terms of Paul Kurtz, he had a real sense that we should be humanitarian.

49:15

We should be doing, you know, deeds for our society.

49:22

But a transhumanist says, oh, wait a second. We're not concerned about this world. We're concerned about getting into the next world where we can be, you know, fully computerized and become

49:35

God. And so they really separated themselves from secular humanism.

49:40

And of course, with the death of Paul Kurtz, really, secular humanism really has really fallen to the side.

49:49

And I could mention another thing, too. When you think in terms of transhumanism, you see the whole evolutionary process is, from their point of view, is too slow.

49:58

But if we get the place where we're in control and using technology and so on, we can accelerate, as they would see it, the whole evolutionary process very, very quickly.

50:10

Wow. Well, we're going to go to our midway break right now. This is an elongated break that we have to conduct to accommodate our friends at Grace Life Radio 90 .1

50:20

FM in Lake City, Florida, who require a 12 -minute break between our two segments.

50:27

So if you would like to join us on the air, why not write some questions right now while we're on a break and send them in as soon as possible.

50:34

There are a couple of people still waiting to have their questions asked and answered, and we will get to you as soon as possible. But our email address is chrizarnsen at gmail .com,

50:43

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, at least your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside of the

50:52

USA. Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back with David Herbert and more of our discussion on Becoming God, Transhumanism, and the

51:00

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01:00:01

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Or go to batterydepot .com. That's batterydepot .com. And I wonder if Battery Depot has batteries for cyborgs.

01:01:48

That would be a good line of batteries for them to develop. If you've just tuned us in, our guest today is

01:01:56

David Herbert. He is the author of Becoming God, Transhumanism, and the Quest for Cybernetic Immortality.

01:02:03

We're going to be returning to our discussion momentarily, but I just have a few important announcements to make.

01:02:10

The Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island, New York, and the Long Island Spurgeon Fellowship present the

01:02:18

Gospel of the Reformation, a 500th anniversary celebration featuring my friend

01:02:23

Dr. Tony Costa, who I just mentioned to Dr. Herbert a little while ago. Dr. Tony Costa, who is a professor of apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary.

01:02:35

He is going to be joined by Pastor Caleb Bunch, Pastor Bruce Bennett, and Pastor David Corson at the

01:02:42

Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island from Friday, September 29th through Saturday, September 30th.

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And if you would like to register for this conference, it's free of charge, but please call them to register at 631 -806 -0614.

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Word of Truth Church can also be found at wotchurch .com.

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That's W -O -T standing for Word of Truth Church dot com. Then on the very next day,

01:03:21

Dr. Tony Costa will be also speaking at Hope Reformed Baptist Church of Medford, Long Island, New York, located on Route 112 in Medford, Long Island.

01:03:33

And he will be speaking at the 11 a .m. service at Hope Reformed Baptist Church of Medford, Long Island.

01:03:40

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01:03:49

That's 631 -696 -5711. Or you can go to hopereformedli .net.

01:03:57

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01:04:07

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01:04:13

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01:04:20

The speakers include Kent Hughes, Peter Jones, Tom Nettles, Dennis Cahill, and Scott Oliphant.

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The theme is for Still Our Ancient Foe, referring to Satan, of course. And that is from the line from Martin Luther's classic

01:04:35

Reformational hymn, A Mighty Fortress. If you would like to register for that conference, go to alliancenet .org,

01:04:43

click on events, and then click on Quaker Town Conference on Reformed Theology. And then coming up from January 17th through the 20th in Atlanta, Georgia, we have the

01:04:55

G3 Conference returning to Atlanta. G3 standing for Grace, Gospel, and Glory.

01:05:02

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01:05:09

Knowing God, a Biblical Understanding of Discipleship. January 17th will be exclusively in the

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01:05:41

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01:05:50

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01:08:23

Well, we are now back to our discussion that we began a little over an hour ago with Dr.

01:08:30

David Herbert on Becoming God, Transhumanism and the Quest for Cybernetic Immortality.

01:08:36

If you'd like to join us on the air with a question for Dr. Herbert, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

01:08:43

chrisarnsen at gmail .com, and we do have a listener. This is quite interesting,

01:08:49

Dr. Herbert. I don't know if our listener in Rock Hill, South Carolina, Toni with an

01:08:55

I, I don't know if she's a prophetess, and I'm saying that tongue -in -cheek because I don't believe in extra -biblical revelation, but Reverend Buzz Taylor and I, my co -hosts, during the break, we were actually discussing this question that she poses.

01:09:12

She says or asks, I was wondering how your guest views transhumanism with regard to eschatology and end -time events as prophesied in scripture?

01:09:26

Yeah, that's a good question. Again, I haven't done a lot of research in that area, so I don't know,

01:09:34

I don't want to move too quickly in that area. As I said, I'm a historian and I went back.

01:09:41

My desire was to say, okay, how did it come about and why are we are today?

01:09:50

I don't really feel too comfortable because I haven't done a lot of research on the whole idea of the compatibility of transhumanism and eschatology.

01:10:02

Yeah, well, the reason why the Reverend Buzz Taylor and I brought it up is because it would seem that the biblical record would discount the cybernetic humanoids, however you want to describe them, as having taken over the earth, if you will.

01:10:19

If the dream of those in the transhumanist society were to come true, it would seem to conflict with the biblical record of there being humans, real humans, on the earth when the

01:10:32

Lord returns, etc. Yeah, I would certainly concur with that. I think this is, as I mentioned before, one of the greatest dangers to the

01:10:43

Church of Jesus Christ. Now, how the Lord's going to intervene and how that's going to work out biblically,

01:10:53

I really haven't given a lot of thought and I wouldn't feel comfortable making any proclamations.

01:11:02

Of course, we do know that God is sovereign. He's in control and where the technology is going to lead us and when the

01:11:09

Lord intervenes, I don't feel comfortable really talking about that.

01:11:15

All right, well, let's go through, before we even get to the core issue of why this is the most dangerous threat, in your opinion, against the

01:11:23

Christian Church, let's go through some of the main characters, some of them you've already mentioned, but perhaps you could go into further detail about some of the core figures involved in this movement.

01:11:34

Let's start with Ray Kurzweil. Oh, Ray Kurzweil certainly would be, he is the leading transhumanist, a very highly intelligent man.

01:11:45

I mean, he, when you think in terms of the photocopier, he's the one who invented that. And the reason why he invented it, what he's trying to do is to, how can you take written words and convert them into audible sounds for the deaf?

01:12:03

And he did that. I mean, he designed that. And of course, you think in terms of the first machine, it would be the size of a desk.

01:12:12

And today, you can hold that thing in your hand. You think in terms of the synthesizer, he and Stevie Wonder, he, if you go into a store, the music store, and you see a synthesizer, you'll see his name on that,

01:12:28

Kurzweil. And he's written some other important books called The Singularity is

01:12:34

Near. This is the point, as I mentioned, in 2045, although, mind you, in doing some of my research for this program, he's already brought the date up now.

01:12:47

He feels this singularity, or this time when we have the emerging of humanity with technology, he's now saying it's 2029.

01:12:57

And then also, he's written a book called How to Create a Mind. And Larry Page from Google came to him and said, listen,

01:13:06

Ray, we want you to come and become part of the Google team.

01:13:12

And again, he sort of laughed. He's a man who's a multimillionaire with a number of companies.

01:13:18

And so the first time, he's been hired by someone. But he took, in 2012, after writing that book, he has now become the chief engineer in Google dealing with the whole idea of life extension.

01:13:33

By the way, I forgot to tell Tony in Rock Hill, South Carolina, I need your full mailing address.

01:13:39

I just have your city and state because we're going to mail you a free copy of Becoming God, Transhumanism and the

01:13:46

Quest for Cybernetic Immortality, compliments of our friends at Joshua Press, and also compliments of our friends at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for BibleBookService .com,

01:14:02

CVBBS .com, who will be actually physically mailing that book out to you.

01:14:07

So please give us your full mailing address. Thanks again for submitting an excellent question,

01:14:13

Tony. And if anybody else would like to submit one, our email address again is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:14:21

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Before I go to any of the other listeners waiting to have their questions asked, let's move on to Aubrey de

01:14:29

Grey. Yeah, he's a British scientist, basically life extension again.

01:14:37

And he's using biology, he feels that if we use biology, and as a biologist, he feels that in time, we could, what, get to the point where we can use biology for life extension.

01:14:54

That's really his main thrust. And one of the other main figures in the book that you address is

01:15:02

Kevin Warwick. Yeah, another British scientist and engineer.

01:15:08

He's done some interesting work. He's the one that, when you think in terms of, he had, what, a mechanism, radio thing put into his, in his arm.

01:15:23

And he was the first one that was able to use this device, hooked up to a computer.

01:15:30

And he also was able to, using the computer, connect off of New York. And so he's, as an engineer, he's done some interesting things.

01:15:42

Of course, his whole goal would be to become a cyborg. That's his goal in life.

01:15:49

And even putting things in, you know, implantables in your head. So he's done a lot of areas with the implantation of computer devices into the body.

01:16:01

And where does Natasha Vita -Moore come into the situation? Yeah, now, as I mentioned,

01:16:07

I mentioned her earlier. She's one of the leading female transhumanists.

01:16:17

She's a designer. And so her area is to how can we design a body that would be, she wants to maintain a human body, but to design a body that would have the, all these capabilities.

01:16:38

I mean, an extended heart rate, a brain that is much more capable than our body now.

01:16:48

And how we could swim. She's even thinking, for example, if you have this body could dive into the water, and you stay under the water for an extended period of time, because of the capabilities of the body.

01:17:02

So that's where she fits in, in the whole area of transhumanism.

01:17:08

Now, where are we in regard to technology that you know of?

01:17:16

And when I say we, I mean, where is the scientific world at in regard to the development of this technology, you know, that is being actually used right now, even experimentally with human beings?

01:17:35

How far has science come in regard to the artificial elements of humans that are in some way, at least they perceive them to be beneficial to them?

01:17:48

Okay, that's a good question. I was going to bring that up myself. When you think in terms of the stages that we've gone through, okay, the first stage is what's called holdable.

01:17:58

Okay? When you think in terms of your cell phone, just go and sit in the airport.

01:18:04

I remember, for example, my son lives in out west, and you go sit in the airport and look around, and 99 % of the people are sitting there, and they got their cell phones in their hand.

01:18:16

And so the first stage is that stage there. And we're certainly beyond that. I mean, when you think in terms of people, just go outside and look around and how many people are walking around holding the cell phone.

01:18:31

The next stage is what's called, so we got holdable, we got wearable. And you think in terms of Google, you got

01:18:37

Google Glass. These are the glasses that they are made.

01:18:43

Of course, you got your smartphone, your smartwatch, the thinking of putting what, these whole thing in your clothing, like a

01:18:56

GPF, put them into your clothing. The next, so we got holdable, wearable.

01:19:03

Now, the next one is implantable. Now, that's really interesting. I found an article, and this is a company in Wisconsin.

01:19:13

And this is where we're coming. It's called Three Square Market.

01:19:19

And as of last week, what they are doing is that they're putting the

01:19:26

RFID, radio frequency identification devices, in their hand.

01:19:34

They got 50 employees that are going to put these devices between your index finger and your thumb.

01:19:41

And of course, with that device, of course, they can open the door to their place of employment.

01:19:51

They can turn on their computers. And also within that, they would have their medical records.

01:19:58

And so this is where we are right now. And then the last one, and this would be down in the future, this is called ingestibles.

01:20:07

This is part of the work of Ray Kurzweil. He's anticipating that we will have within our body about a million nanobots.

01:20:20

These would be smaller than red blood cells. And with these nanobots, they would be there to enhance the body, you know, physically.

01:20:31

If there's any problems we have, say cancer or whatever, these nanobots would take care of that.

01:20:37

But here's the other thing, Chris, is that with these nanobots, of course, they'd be also located in your brain.

01:20:44

And this would then connect the people to the cloud. And so they have a, what, really a double purpose.

01:20:55

So when you think in terms of those four stages, here we are in 2017.

01:21:03

And as of a few weeks ago, people are starting to put these implantables in their hands. And I certainly, and when we're doing the questionnaire for the book, there are people that would gladly have them put into their heads.

01:21:18

Well, going back to something that I touched on earlier. If I were in a horrific accident, and you know, as long as I knew that there would be nothing done to my mind that would somehow alter who

01:21:39

I was as a person. And as long as, you know, things like my love for God and love for my family and friends and things like that were not negatively altered.

01:21:56

Many of the things that you discussed, as far as the body is concerned, would seem to be very helpful, good and wonderful things that we should celebrate.

01:22:06

Where would the line be crossed, in your opinion? Well, I think the thing is, again, you're right.

01:22:15

I mean, I wear glasses, I mean, to aid. I mean, for example, if I had some problem with my hearing, my wife wears hearing aids.

01:22:24

And these are all important things. But I think it's, as I mentioned before, is that when you move along the spectrum, again, the whole idea is to rid ourselves of death, that we can get to a place where we can transfer over and we're in control of our development, our human development.

01:22:49

And so it's on that spectrum. And again, as I mentioned, as we're moving along, there's a tremendous dependency, like we're even talking about addiction, that people cannot be, what, separated from their technology.

01:23:06

And I think that's a real danger. Well, here we have something that's very similar to the question

01:23:12

I asked. Maggie in Dallas, Texas says, don't think this too medieval a mentality,

01:23:20

I hope. At what point should we be concerned with altering the image of God too far, or insofar that we make it an abomination?

01:23:32

Well, I think, for example, as I said, we're on that path right now. And the thing is, you see, with Google, just go back to Google, you think of the tremendous control they have.

01:23:44

And that's, I suppose, another thing too, Chris, is that when you're thinking of connecting people to the cloud,

01:23:52

I mean, I have a computer here, and the program I use for my books,

01:23:58

I bought it. But if I was to update that, I have to get one that connects me to the cloud.

01:24:07

And so that, so we're, I guess the whole question of, you know, control, and who's going to be controlling all this stuff.

01:24:17

And, by the way, Maggie, you have won our final copy of Becoming God, Transhumanism, and the

01:24:24

Quest for Cybernetic Immortality. We need your full mailing address in Dallas, Texas, so that Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for Bible Book Service, can ship that out to you.

01:24:39

So keep your eye open in the mail for a shipping label that has a return address that says

01:24:45

CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for Bible Book Service .com, CVBBS .com. And we thank

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01:25:02

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01:25:07

Please get us your mailing address, and hopefully you'll get that in about a week or so. And we're going to be going to our final break right now.

01:25:17

If anybody else would like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

01:25:27

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Harvey Cedars, where Christ finds people and changes lives. Welcome back.

01:31:26

This is Chris Arns. And if you just tuned us in for the last 90 minutes and the next half hour to come, our guest has been and will continue to be

01:31:33

Dr. David Herbert. We are discussing his book, Becoming God, Transhumanism and the

01:31:40

Quest for Cybernetic Immortality. If you'd like to join us on the air for the question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

01:31:49

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Please give us at least your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

01:32:00

USA. And we have RJ in White Plains, New York, who asks, Do we not need to be careful about being superstitious?

01:32:09

There have been many well -intentioned Christians throughout history who were opposed to certain developments in technology and medicine that viewed these things as dangerous for unbiblical reasons and were purely superstitious in their reaction against them.

01:32:27

Don't you think that we have to be very careful about not repeating history in this regard?

01:32:36

Well, as I've been sort of listening to the commercials here, one of the thoughts was going through my mind, and I went through those steps, holdable, wearable, implantable, ingestible.

01:32:47

I see the whole idea of control. I mean, when you think in terms of this is the problem, and when people become controlled by devices to the place of addiction,

01:33:02

I think that there's concern there. And I understand what the person's saying, but I again, and as I mentioned before, is that we do have an organization.

01:33:15

And I think in terms of, well, not only Google, but you've got Google, Facebook, I mean, all these technologies, and these men that are controlling these are men who have an agenda.

01:33:27

Well, let's revisit exactly why you believe that this is the most dangerous thing facing the future of the

01:33:36

Christian church. That's quite a remarkable claim there. Well, it's interesting.

01:33:43

I'm just getting into this kind of research, but it's interesting when you think in terms of the major religions.

01:33:51

One of the religions, okay, and I think in terms of Mormonism, they've been involved in transhumanism for a big way for the last nine years.

01:34:01

Really? Oh, absolutely. Well, you think in terms of theology. I mean, they see that we are all becoming

01:34:08

God, even Jesus. He's in this pathway of developing. And so this whole theology just fits in beautifully with Mormonism.

01:34:17

Yeah, yeah. Well, they think that they are, not necessarily that we all are. Well, but the thing is, you see, the theology of transhumanism and Mormonism, they parallel one another.

01:34:31

But what is helping, too, is that we're now having groups called Christian transhumanists. Really? Oh, absolutely.

01:34:39

There's a church in, the First Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, the fellow is

01:34:45

Christopher Benick. He is, what, very, very supportive of transhumanism, and it's part of his ministry.

01:34:56

And another fellow called Micaiah Redding, he's a computer expert. They're quite involved in the

01:35:04

Christian transhumanist movement. Wow. And also, for example, we have this, of course, as I mentioned, the book

01:35:13

I just got to writing on, Islam and Christianity. There's also the

01:35:19

Islamic transhumanist group. And so they, you think in terms of these religions, they're now moving in and becoming part and parcel of this technology.

01:35:33

So it's coming Christian from a number of fronts. Now, what would be different about the theists?

01:35:41

And I'm assuming, although I'm not 100 % certain about the Presbyterian transhumanists being theists, because there are some from the left wing of Presbyterianism that might even be atheists while simultaneously claiming to be

01:35:56

Presbyterian. But there would be theists that you're mentioning, and the most bizarre,

01:36:03

I think, would be the Islamic transhumanists, because they even believe that the most horrific sin that one can commit is the sin of shirk that attributes partners with God, and therefore they even condemn the belief in the deity of Christ as something that is an abomination.

01:36:27

So the idea of a human becoming God through cybernetic technologies would seem to be in conflict with even

01:36:34

Islam. But if you could touch on the theists involved with this and how it differs from the atheists that you mentioned earlier.

01:36:42

Well, when you think in terms of these organizations, I mean, if you walk around, and of course, in London, we have 35 ,000

01:36:50

Muslims living in London, and you walk around and they're young people, they now become attached to this whole thing.

01:36:56

And I can see in the future where your religions are going to be morphing into this whole idea of transhumanism, whether it be

01:37:07

Christian or otherwise. And, but is there any explanation, like, for instance, the those that are professing to be

01:37:14

Christian, do they see a future just like the atheistic transhumanists that would be devoid of any fleshly physical humanity existing in the future, where it's everything is just computerized and cybernetic technology?

01:37:35

What is their view, the ones that claim to be Christian? Well, I can't speak with any definitiveness, because I've only just started researching this aspect and looking at it.

01:37:46

One thing that I, in this, Chris Bennett, from the church in Florida, he is linking up the singularity with the return of the

01:37:56

Lord. Wow. So this is,

01:38:02

I think, Chris, now you've asked some good questions, but I think this is one area where we need to do more research, and I think it's going to be, come more and more to the fore, as we see the technology, and again,

01:38:17

I have to stress, the thing is, the tremendous control that it's having upon our young, well, not only young people,

01:38:25

I mean, I see older people with the cell phones in their hands, too. So I think that's a big thing, is control, and who is in control?

01:38:35

And I can see the churches, you know, here's an example.

01:38:41

On Sunday, we brought some new young people, they go to one of the colleges here in London, and we were sitting together, there was six of us in a row, and when the person that started to preach the sermon, the four young people beside us all took out their cell phones.

01:39:01

They have no Bibles, but they, no, that's not true, one of our Chinese friends does, but the majority of them, they brought out their cell phones, and they were ready.

01:39:11

And I kind of talk with my wife now, we had a Bible, they all had cell phones. So I guess that's the point,

01:39:19

I mean, it's the whole question of control. And you have a concluding chapter in your book about the resurrected body, the

01:39:27

Christian's hope, if you could explain further. Well, that's, you see, that's our hope.

01:39:33

I mean, I have no desire to become part of a computer. Usually, tongue in cheek,

01:39:39

I say, well, if you're going to put me in a computer, make sure it's a Mac. But the... Yeah, but good luck getting parts when you fall into a problem, or a repair.

01:39:54

Yeah, you see, the thing is, as a Christian, what I'm looking for is a resurrected body, a body which includes my personality, my mind, and one that's totally, you know, holy and acceptable before God.

01:40:13

So I have no desire to lose my personality.

01:40:19

I'm looking forward to a new body that comes through Jesus Christ, to have one just like He has.

01:40:27

And certainly that's not the hope of a transhumanist. I mean, He wants to emerge with technology.

01:40:33

Now, the big question is, if they do emerge, and this is one thing they're wrestling with, do

01:40:40

I lose my identity? What do I become when I become part of, say, some computerized substrate?

01:40:49

Whereas, as a Christian, I'm going to have a new body, and that body will certainly be...

01:40:55

I'll be with the Lord, and of course, I'll be understood and recognizable by my wife and other

01:41:04

Christians who are going to spend eternity with me. And that's certainly not the goal of a transhumanist.

01:41:10

He wants to get rid of this body, because he feels that because of his weakness, he feels that taking on some computerized form, that he's going to be strengthened.

01:41:21

Let's see, we have BB in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who says, a number of years ago, there seemed to be quite a scare regarding what became known as test tube babies, babies that were developed in a laboratory without the normal God -given procreation activity that would bring about human life.

01:41:47

Does your study have anything to do with this phenomenon, where we may have multitudes of humans in our future that have come to be without normal parental procreation?

01:42:03

Well, they are talking about, you know, the whole idea of...

01:42:13

I'm just now, certainly, this is one of... I've done a lot of research in this area, but I've certainly seen it, where we can design our children before they're actually born.

01:42:24

You know, their mental capacity, their traits, and so on. That's what

01:42:29

Hitler was trying to do. Well, that's right. But you see, they're using... they want to use technology to do that.

01:42:37

And so, that's about the only comment

01:42:42

I can make in reference to that. This is one of the goals, you know, as I said, design our children.

01:42:50

We have Arnie in Perry County, Pennsylvania, who says, what do these transhumanists envision as being the intelligentsia that would be involved in repair and other things that go haywire with these humanoids of the future?

01:43:11

I'm just not too sure. I'm just not too sure the intent of that question. Well, for instance, if human beings are no longer in existence, and their ideology, their idea of nirvana, of cyborgs roaming the earth without any physical human traits left, if there's going to be a malfunction with these things, who is going to be repair...

01:43:36

I'm assuming this is what our listener is getting at. Who's going to be repairing these cyborgs?

01:43:43

Well, as I said before, Chris, make sure you get a Mac. That'll take care of that, right? That's a good question.

01:43:50

I don't know. I don't know really how to answer that question. I guess their feeling would be...

01:43:58

maybe this is one thing I can say to you. One of the things we call mind uploading, what they're hoping, and of course, you see the most important thing of your...

01:44:09

of our existence is our mind. Again, another sort of ancillary topic, of course, is the whole idea of cryopreservation.

01:44:21

That's a very, very important aspect, you know, to have your body frozen, and especially your head, because it is what pertains all your identity.

01:44:34

And so the whole idea of mind uploading is that, you know, having a backup for your mind plays a very, very important role in this whole scheme.

01:44:44

That's actually been... talk about that has been going on for decades. There were rumors, I don't know if the

01:44:50

Walt Disney rumor is true, but do you know anything about that?

01:44:55

Is Walt Disney really frozen to... in hopes that... I don't, I think there is a change, if I can understand correctly, and Ted Williams is another one too.

01:45:04

That's right, that was very recent. That was just a few years ago. Yeah, now, I'm not too sure about Walt Disney, because I think, if I remember correctly, there was a...

01:45:14

the family changed their mind, and I think he was buried. But as far as...

01:45:20

Sorry, Walt. Yeah, as far as the transhumanism is concerned, like Ray Kurzweil is already...

01:45:26

there's an organization called Alcor. It's in Scottsdale, Arizona, and they already...

01:45:34

the last time I checked, they already have, what, 135 people cryopreserved, but they have a thousand people that have already signed up ready to go, and that's including

01:45:44

Ray Kurzweil. So that's another aspect. You see, if a person dies before the singularity, then what you want to do is, as I said, you have really two options.

01:45:57

You can, for $200 ,000, you can have your whole body cryopreserved, but more importantly, you want to have your head preserved, because that's, like I said before, they...

01:46:09

if you can, what, sort of revive the brain, then they feel that they can then construct a body for it.

01:46:19

But once the body, the brain, or the head is either buried or cremated, then your existence is gone.

01:46:32

Let's see, we have CJ in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who says, are there any from the liberal and leftist community that you are aware of, even scientists who may be joining the more biblically moral and conservative society in protesting against this kind of thing?

01:46:58

Not to my knowledge. I don't know. I haven't heard of any, and I can only go by the universities here in Canada, which they tend to be very leftist, and I can see them being very supportive of this.

01:47:15

I mean, if you've got, say, a large majority of people in academia who are atheists, then the last thing they want to do is die.

01:47:26

Well, I want to make sure that you have at least five minutes to really summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners in an uninterrupted fashion before we take any further questions that may come in.

01:47:41

So you have the floor right now to really make sure that you say everything that you want our listeners to learn today, in summary.

01:47:50

Okay. As I said at the beginning, this is,

01:47:56

I believe, one of the greatest dangers that the church has to face.

01:48:03

And just going back again, the whole idea of the people who are really pushing forth the transhumanist movement, and places like Google and the

01:48:19

Silicon Valley. I mean, they're putting, I talk about billions of dollars into different areas.

01:48:26

Like in the case of Google, they have a company called Calico, and they are, the whole idea is, it's called the

01:48:38

California Life Company. And it was founded by Larry Page. And the whole goal is life extension.

01:48:47

And if you go through, for example, I mentioned Ray Kurzweil, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, these men here are committed to living forever as, what, as post -human.

01:49:07

And so it's real. I look around, and I see the power of this technology.

01:49:15

And I also see, for example, how we are losing control, as we're becoming more and more dependent upon the whole technology.

01:49:24

Now, as a researcher and a writer, I prize and utilize the technology.

01:49:33

As I mentioned before, I control it, it doesn't control me. And as I just mentioned before, like,

01:49:42

I see the stages, how we're going through, how the people are addicted to this technology.

01:49:51

So they're holding it, wearable. And of course, as I've already mentioned, we now talk about implantables.

01:49:58

We have the RFIDs in your country, in Wisconsin, now implanting these things in their hands.

01:50:07

Where's the next step? And so it's there, it's a reality.

01:50:16

And I look at, and then I haven't done a lot of research in this area, but I see some of the religions now, they are starting to, as I mentioned, the

01:50:26

Christian transhumanist movement, they are starting to, what, incorporate biblical ideas into this whole movement.

01:50:37

So I think it's a reality that something, as a Christian community, we need to be aware of, and take the proper steps to make sure our people are informed.

01:50:48

Now, are there any voices that you know of within medicine and science that view this, just because of the technology that we already have, that they view this as, even if it were possible for this to be developed, this kind of level of technology that you're talking about, who are saying, well, even if this were possible, you're talking about hundreds of years into the future.

01:51:17

Is there anybody saying anything like that in the scientific community? It might not even be at all connected to religion or faith, they're just talking about what they know of from medicine and science.

01:51:29

You mean like, are you saying, for example, they would be opposed to this? Maybe not opposed to it because of any ideology that they have, just that they believe that it is perhaps either a scare tactic or that it's not something that we could ever imagine happening within either our lifetime or even the next couple of generations, that this is probably hundreds of years into the future, even if it's possible.

01:51:57

No, I haven't. If anything, I think they're embracing that technology. I mean, you, for example, when you think in terms of in school,

01:52:06

I mean, the children, our students are using technology for doing research and so on, there are many positive things about it.

01:52:16

But again, as I mentioned, it's the whole question of control and dependency.

01:52:24

I've heard nothing, say, from academia that would be opposed to this. I think, if anything, they're promoting it.

01:52:33

And as far as the soul is concerned, obviously, this would be another key thing that would discount this coming to fruition as far as all of humanity globally is concerned, because technology can't possess a soul.

01:52:57

And if these are cyborgs or robotic machines, really, rather than beings, they would be devoid of souls.

01:53:08

And therefore, the scriptures also would discount the possibility of this becoming a technology that completely replaces human beings.

01:53:25

According to the scriptures, that could not ever happen. Well, I agree with you. But just keep in mind, as I think

01:53:31

I've mentioned before, that when you think in terms, I'm not going to speak in terms of Canada, although I can't speak in terms of the

01:53:39

United States, but here in Canada, the scriptures have been totally marginalized.

01:53:44

Christianity has no part. I mean, you think in terms of the laws we make. Again, in 2006, we endorsed the whole idea of homosexual marriages.

01:53:57

We have 100 ,000 abortions a year. And so when we're making legislation, in some ways,

01:54:07

I see some of the legislation coming down with our provincial government, I mean, they're anti -family.

01:54:14

And so as a society, we are becoming more and more godless.

01:54:23

And I can see that this technology aids and abets that type of mentality.

01:54:32

Well, I want to make sure that our listeners have all of your contact information.

01:54:38

First of all, the fine folks at Joshua Press who provided these books today that we gave away, if anybody listening would like to find out more about Becoming God, Transhumanism, and the

01:54:52

Quest for Cybernetic Immortality, you can go to joshuapress .com,

01:54:59

joshuapress .com. Also, just always keep in mind that you can always order any book that we bring up on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, you can always order that through Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for BibleBookService .com,

01:55:17

CVBBS .com. And if they don't have it when you contact them, they can certainly order it.

01:55:25

And do you personally have any other contact information, Dr. Herbert, that you would like to provide for our listeners?

01:55:32

No, I don't really. I think that the Sola Scriptura or Joshua Press, I mean, that's the would be, they're the ones that are publishing and distributing my book.

01:55:43

Tell us about Sola Scriptura, because I don't have right in front of me the contact information for Sola Scriptura.

01:55:50

Yeah, it's the same as Joshua Press. Okay, joshuapress .com, joshuapress .com.

01:55:57

And, well, I would just want to thank you so much for being on the program, and this was certainly a fascinating discussion, and I'd be looking forward to see what kind of sequels you write as the technology develops and other things come about in the news.

01:56:14

And I do also want to remind our listeners one more time that the Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island, New York, in cooperation with Long Island Spurgeon Fellowship, are having the

01:56:26

Gospel of the Reformation 500th anniversary celebration in Farmingville, Long Island, on Friday, September 29th, and Saturday, September 30th.

01:56:36

Please call them at 631 -806 -0614. Area code 631 -806 -0614.

01:56:45

The following day, October 1st, Dr. Tony Costa, who is speaking at that 500th anniversary celebration, will also be speaking at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Long Island in Medford, New York, at their 11 a .m.

01:57:01

service. You can go to hopereformedli .net, hopereformedli .net,

01:57:08

and don't forget to try to join me also at the Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology, November 17th through the 18th, at the

01:57:16

Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Quakertown, Pennsylvania. That website is alliancenet .org,

01:57:23

alliancenet .org, and click on Events, and then click on Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology, and then don't forget about the

01:57:32

G3 conference coming to Atlanta, Georgia from the 17th through the 20th of January.

01:57:40

The 17th, as I mentioned earlier, is exclusively a Spanish edition of the conference, and from the 18th through the 20th is exclusively in English, and the speakers are many at that conference, including

01:57:52

Stephen Lawson, Votie Baucom, Phil Johnson, Keith Gay, H .B. Charles Jr., Tim Challies, Josh Bice, James White, Tom Askell, Anthony Matheny, and Michael Kruger, and others.

01:58:03

The theme is Understanding, or should I say Knowing God, a Biblical Understanding of Discipleship.

01:58:09

You could go to g3conference .com, g3conference .com,

01:58:16

and tomorrow I hope that you tune in because we are going to have a first -time guest tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron as well.

01:58:26

His name is James Dolezal, and we are going to be discussing tomorrow his book,

01:58:33

All That Is In God. All That Is In God, it is a book that I have been hearing about from a lot of folks, not only listeners in the

01:58:44

Iron Sharpens Iron audience, but scholars and so on that I know who are raving about this book, and who actually are the ones who urged me to interview

01:58:54

James Dolezal. So he will be on tomorrow 4 to 6 p .m., and I hope that you join us tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron and be prepared to submit questions for James Dolezal, and we have also been notified by the publisher of his book,

01:59:11

All That Is In God, Reformation Heritage Books. They are providing us with some giveaways to those who submit questions.

01:59:21

But I want to thank you again, Dr. David Herbert, for being on our program. I want to thank you, the

01:59:26

Reverend Buzz Taylor, for being my co -host today. I want to thank everybody who listened today, especially those who took the time to write in questions, and if you haven't given me your mailing addresses yet, those of you who won the book, please let me have those mailing addresses as soon as possible so I can give them to you.

01:59:48

I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner.