TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures: An Intersectional Case

The cyborgization of brainbodies with computer hardware and software today ranges in scope from the realization of Brain–Computer Interfaces (BCIs) to visions of mind upload to silicon, the latter being targeted toward a transhuman future. Refining posthumanist concepts to formulate a posthumanities perspective, and contrasting those approaches with transhumanist trajectories, I explore the intersectional dimension of realizations and visions of neuro-technological developments, which I name TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures. In an intersectional analysis, I investigate the embedding and legitimation of transhumanist visions brought about by neuroscientific research and neuro-technological development based on a concept of modern neurobiological determinism. The conjoined trajectories of BCI research and development and transhumanist visions perpetuate the inscription of intersectional norms, with the concomitant danger of producing discriminatory effects. This culminates in normative capacity being seen as a conflation of the abled, successful, white masculinized techno-brain with competition. My deeper analysis, however, also enables displacements within recent BCI research and development to be characterized: from ‘‘thought-translation” to affective conditioning and from controllability to obstinacy within the BCI, going so far as to open the closed loop. These realizations challenge notions about the BCI's actor status and agency and foster questions about shifts in the corresponding subject–object relations. Based on these analyses, I look at the effects of neuro-technological and transhumanist governmentality on the question of whose lives are to be improved and whose lives should be excluded from these developments. Within the framework of political feminist materialisms, I combine the concept of posthumanities with my concept of TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures to envision and discuss a material-discursive strategy, encompassing dimensions of affect, sociality, resistance, compassion, cultural diversity, ethnic diversity, multiple sexes/sexualities, aging, dis/abilities—in short, all of this “intersectional stuff”—as well as obstinate techno-brain agencies and contumacies foreseen in these cyborgian futures.

Machiavellians Approve of Mind Upload Technology Directly and Through Utilitarianism – Moral psychological implications for AI Safety Research

Mind upload (MU), making a digital copy of one’s brain, is a part of the ultimate transhumanistic dream leading to eternal life and end of suffering and it is considered as one possible route for creating an Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). However, AI Safety Research has pointed to one major risk in creating AGI by MU. Depending on the route that is taken towards the AGIs, it is possible that the person whose brain gets uploaded first could be a psychopath or a selfish individual who wishes to use this technology for personal gain. We studied if peoples acceptance of MU is associated with their individual differences in Dark Triad traits (Machiavellianism & psychopathy), sexual disgust sensitivity, and high-conflict utilitarian judgments. We show with Structural Equation Modelling for the first time that 1) Machiavellianism is associated with positive approval of Mind Upload directly and 2) indirectly through Utilitarianism. Results suggest that the perceived risk of Machiavellians (trait related to psychopathy) preferring MU should be taken seriously.