''TechnoCalyps'' is a 2006 Belgian

transhumanism Transhumanism is a philosophical and intellectual movement which advocates the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available sophisticated technologies that can greatly enhance longevity and cognition. Transhuma ...

documentary film written and directed by Frank Theys. It explores the advance of technology.

Documentary precept

Set as a three-part documentary, ''TechnoCalyps'' posits that

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

robotics Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrate ...

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech r ...

, bionics, and nanotechnology seem to be converging towards a goal of having mankind transcend human limits. "Director conducts his inquiry into the scientific, ethical and metaphysical dimensions of technological development. The film includes interviews by top experts and thinkers on the subject worldwide".

Cast

Jay McMahon narrated the documentary that has following interviewees: *

Ian Buruma Ian Buruma (born December 28, 1951) is a Dutch writer and editor who lives and works in the United States. In 2017, he became editor of ''The New York Review of Books'', but left the position in September 2018. Much of his writing has focused on ...

* Jean-Jacques Cassiman * L. Stephen Coles * Sadaputa Dasa *

Hugo De Garis Hugo de Garis (born 1947, Sydney, Australia) is a retired researcher in the sub-field of artificial intelligence (AI) known as evolvable hardware. He became known in the 1990s for his research on the use of genetic algorithms to evolve artifici ...

Aubrey de Grey Aubrey David Nicholas Jasper de Grey (; born 20 April 1963) is an English author and biomedical gerontologist. He is the author of ''The Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging'' (1999) and co-author of ''Ending Aging'' (2007). He is known ...

* Theodore John Kaczynski *

Raymond Kurzweil Raymond Kurzweil ( ; born February 12, 1948) is an American computer scientist, author, inventor, and futurist. He is involved in fields such as optical character recognition (OCR), text-to-speech synthesis, speech recognition technology, and e ...

Jeffrey Lichtman Jeffrey Harris Lichtman (born June 5, 1965) is a New York-based criminal defense lawyer. Early life and education Jeffrey Lichtman was born on June 5, 1965, in Newark, New Jersey, United States. He grew up in Clark, New Jersey. He attended Emor ...

* Ralph C. Merkle *

Marvin Minsky Marvin Lee Minsky (August 9, 1927 – January 24, 2016) was an American cognitive and computer scientist concerned largely with research of artificial intelligence (AI), co-founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AI laboratory, ...

Hans Moravec Hans Peter Moravec (born November 30, 1948, Kautzen, Austria) is an adjunct faculty member at the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA. He is known for his work on robotics, artificial intelligence, and writings ...

* Max More *

David F. Noble David Franklin Noble (July 22, 1945 – December 27, 2010Morrow, Adria"David Noble, academic and activist, dies at 65" ''The Globe and Mail'', December 28, 2010, accessed December 30, 2010.) was a historian and critic of technology, science ...

Mark Pesce Mark D. Pesce ( ; born 1962) is an American-Australian author, researcher, engineer, futurist and teacher. Early life Pesce was born in Everett, Massachusetts in 1962. In September 1980, Pesce attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MI ...

Joe Rosen Joe Rosen (December 25, 1920 – October 12, 2009) was an American comic book artist, primarily known for his work as a letterer. Over the course of his career with Marvel Comics and DC Comics, Rosen lettered such titles as ''The Fantastic Four'', ...

Kirkpatrick Sale Kirkpatrick Sale (born June 27, 1937) is an American author who has written prolifically about political decentralism, environmentalism, luddism and technology. He has been described as having a "philosophy unified by decentralism" and as being " ...

Anders Sandberg Anders Sandberg (born 11 July 1972) is a Swedish researcher, futurist and transhumanist. He holds a PhD in computational neuroscience from Stockholm University, and is currently a senior research fellow at the Future of Humanity Institute at th ...

* Richard Seed * Bruce Sterling *

Gregory Stock Gregory Stock is a biophysicist, best-selling author, biotech entrepreneur, and the former director of the Program on Medicine, Technology and Society at UCLA’s School of Medicine. His interests lie in the scientific and evolutionary as well as ...

* Mark W. Tilden *

Frank Tipler Frank Jennings Tipler (born February 1, 1947) is an American mathematical physicist and cosmologist, holding a joint appointment in the Departments of Mathematics and Physics at Tulane University. Tipler has written books and papers on the Omeg ...

Margaret Wertheim Margaret Wertheim (born 20 August 1958) is an Australian-born science writer, curator, and artist based in the United States. She is the author of books on the cultural history of physics, and has written about science, including for the ''New Yo ...

* Robert J. White *

Robert Anton Wilson Robert Anton Wilson (born Robert Edward Wilson; January 18, 1932 – January 11, 2007) was an American author, futurist, psychologist, and self-described agnostic mystic. Recognized within Discordianism as an Episkopos, pope and saint, Wilson ...

Terence McKenna Terence Kemp McKenna (November 16, 1946 – April 3, 2000) was an American ethnobotanist and mystic who advocated the responsible use of naturally occurring psychedelic plants. He spoke and wrote about a variety of subjects, including ...

* Rael *

Osman Bakar Osman Bakar (born 1946) is an emeritus professor of philosophy at the University of Malaya, the Chair Professor and Director of Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien Centre for Islamic Studies (SOASCIS), Universiti Brunei Darussalam and an Islamic philosop ...

* Michel Baudry * Ted Berger * Yang Dan * Thomas B. DeMarse * Anne Foerst * Erin D. Green * Mark Humayun * Hamada Kazuyuki * Carlo Montemagno *

Natasha Vita-More Natasha Vita-More (born February 23, 1950) is a strategic designer, author, speaker and innovator within the scientific and technological framework of human enhancement and life extension. Her interests are located within the ethical uses of scie ...

* Jim Yount

Reception

'' H+ Magazine'' wrote that the film focuses "on the various emerging technologies that Transhumanism has coalesced around and feature illuminating (or potentially terrifying) interviews with scientists working in these fields", and ''Crónicas de Esperantia'' wrote that the film was an excellent documentary that shares some future keys. Christopher Webster of ''Quiet Earth'' reviewed the documentary and wrote that it "is a really smart look at humanity's quest for immortality through science" and how with its focus on hard science "gets into how this quest effects art and culture and how the whole mess intersects to form the very fabric of who we are."

References

External links

* * {{official website, http://www.technocalyps.com/
''TechnoCalyps'': Part I. TransHuman

''TechnoCalyps'': Part II. Preparing for the Singularity

''TechnoCalyps'': Part III. The Digital Messiah
Transhumanism Futurology documentaries 2000s English-language films

Documentary precept

Cast

Reception

See also

References

External links