Transhumanist Religious Experience: Beyond Secular Faith?
In this article, we advance a case for considering transhumanism as a religion. Following William James, we think of "religion" as a set of experiences that define and shape one's identity. These may include peak experiences, the feeling of transcendence, and also access to previously hidden knowled...
| Publicado en: | Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science Vol. 61; no. 1; pp. 158 - 178 |
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| Autores principales: | , |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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Open Library of Humanities
Mar2026
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=192794297&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 192794297 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 05912385 ZYG jtl: Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science issn: 05912385 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Mar2026 vid: 61 iid: 1 pid: 15576 pub: Open Library of Humanities artinfo: ui: 192794297 10.16995/zygon.24239 ppf: 158 ppct: 20 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 731KB tig: atl: Transhumanist Religious Experience: Beyond Secular Faith? aug: au: Horváth, Márk Lovász, Ádám affil: Lecturer, Department of Visual Education and Art Theory, Eszterházy Károly Catholic University, Eger, Hungary Independent Researcher, Budapest, Hungary su: Transhumanism Religious experience Revelation Faith James, William, 1842-1910 Religiousness Transcendence (Philosophy) James (Book : Everett) sug: subj: Transhumanism Religious experience Revelation Faith James, William, 1842-1910 Religiousness Transcendence (Philosophy) James (Book : Everett) ab: In this article, we advance a case for considering transhumanism as a religion. Following William James, we think of "religion" as a set of experiences that define and shape one's identity. These may include peak experiences, the feeling of transcendence, and also access to previously hidden knowledge, or gnosis. In James's view, mystical experiences in particular include feelings of ineffability (partial or complete incommunicability), noesis (secret knowledge), and transience and passivity (subordination to a higher power). Using a religious studies framework gleaned from James, we critically examine transhumanism, with an eye towards answering the question of how religious experiences figure into transhumanism, in so far as it functions as a religion. Specifically, we are interested in how transhumanists themselves describe their experiences through the lens of their diverse, often (but not always) explicitly secularist belief systems. Intellectual historian Hava Tirosh-Samuelson has argued for conceiving of transhumanism generally as a "secular faith." Building on cultural anthropologist Jon Bialecki's work on Mormon transhumanism, we argue that the complex technological circumstances of the early twenty-first century have resulted in a technognostic form of religiosity that blends a belief in human technological prowess with a religiously motivated hope for transcendence. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science is the property of Open Library of Humanities and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science holder: Open Library of Humanities dt: @attributes: year: 2026 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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