Stem cells and IVF are Pro-Life 2.0
Pro-Life 3.0 deals with transhumanism.
And transhumanism advocates Singularity (apparently with a capital "S").
Singularity seeks to transcend human limitations through technology:
The human body version 2.0 will be mostly “non-biological” with all of our major systems, nervous, circulatory, immune, digestive, and respiratory augmented or replaced by nanotechnology. Nanobots will allow us to perform Olympic pace sprints for 15 minutes without taking a breath, eat whatever we want without gaining weight, have super-fast, limitless cognitive skills, summon a virtual reality, including a virtual lover, at will, and have a “back-up” of our consciousness ready if needed. We will never get sick and, most importantly to Kurzweil, we will never have to die.
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He goes on to describe human body version 3.0 made a special material where we will be able to “rapidly alter our physical manifestations at will.” With a 3.0 body, not only could change ourselves to be our idea of physical perfection, but our lover could even change us to be what they would prefer.
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Now many people will simply laugh at Kurzweil and dismiss him as some over-optimistic technophile. While his predictions may well be zealous, I would not ignore him or his wares. If even a small percentage of what he discusses in this book comes to pass, we are still in trouble.
I can see some of the potential good in this.
A lot of conditions and diseases could be treated with this technology. For instance, it could eliminate the need for organ donation, which would eliminate one pro-life issue off the table. So that could be a benefit.
But the attempt to re-make human beings raises concerns.
Men will become women, women will become men.
People can change from one race to another. And while there is nothing wrong with that per se what message does that send to certain races?
Although a cursory glance might give one the impression it will lead to diversity, I suspect it will lead to more uniformity among human beings. If you have the power to shape yourself to that degree, will you want to be different or the same? I suspect people will want all the "positive" traits-- whatever those happen to be at the time. Those who can't afford the technology or those who don't want to be re-made will be left behind.
I see another category of discrimination: those who engage in transhumanism, and those who can't or won't.
I know that this is in the future, and we might not even see this for another twenty years. But it's good that the issues are raised now, rather when some legislator has proposed a law and the rest of the culture is already on board.
