Julie Miller

Transhumanism and the Metaphysics of the Human Person

A conversation with Julie Miller,
Thursday, June 13th, 2:00 – 4:00 EST

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There is a growing body of literature and scholarship dedicated to debating the assumptions, promises, and perils of transhumanism. Much of the deliberation centers around the metaphysics of the human person. A typical discourse probes questions like Is human nature fixed or evolving? Is biological embodiment essential to being human? Will the future posthuman ‘you’ still be ‘you’? I focus on this last question and argue that transhumanism’s patternist view of identity cannot account for a self that endures through their proposed enhancements and mind uploading. Further, I will offer an alternative philosophy of human persons as a remedy for the inadequacies of the patternist view.

As background for this session, see her paper, Critiquing Transhumanism’s View of Identity: Is the Posthuman You Really You?

Also of interest: John Lennox - "2084: Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Humanity"

Speaker Bio

Julie earned a PhD in Humanities with a concentration in Philosophy from Faulkner University’s Great Books Honors College, where her dissertation research focused on critiquing the philosophy of transhumanism. She holds an MA in Apologetics from Biola University and a double degree in Finance and Accounting from Texas A&M University. She is the author of the important study, Critiquing Transhumanism: The Human Cost of Pursuing Techno-Utopia (2022), and has also written for An Unexpected Journal and The Worldview Bulletin.

She has served with Ratio Christi, a campus apologetics ministry, for thirteen years, first at Rutgers University and now at Texas A&M University. She is the Treasurer of the Society for Women of Letters (societyforwomenofletters.com) and serves on the Executive Committee of the Evangelical Philosophical Society (epsociety.org). She is motivated by Paul’s message to the Athenian intellectuals in Acts 17 as a model for her work to bring the intellectual voice of Christ to the secular university. Julie lives in College Station, Texas, with her husband of thirty-nine years and their dog, Keeper. They have two married sons and three grandchildren.