"Our Posthuman Future" by Francis Fukuyama

Francis Fukuyama's "Our Posthuman Future" swings a now-rusty axe at advancements in biotechnology, its edges dulled by two decades of scientific progress following its publication in 2002.

At its core, the book muses upon a disingenuous morality play: technology mutates our "absolute human nature". The remedy? A state-guided ethical framework to restrain its monstrous potential.

So much for libertarianism.

Fukuyama's high-mindedness is crafted to appeal to both sides of the political aisle – leftists who fear technological disruption of their cherished shibboleths, and conservatives wary of moral relativism – but ultimately it only highlights his own personal  preferences.

Fukuyama needs a fantastical portrait of human nature, a static essence woven from language, consciousness and "spiritedness". This convenient Nietzschean fiction ignores the messy reality of evolution, whereby our biological and cultural landscapes constantly reshape what it means to be human.

His pronouncements on the dangers of genetic engineering are quaintly outdated, riddled with assumptions about heredity that have been thoroughly debunked by subsequent research. Fukuyama, at time of writing, was unaware for example of the polygenic formation of most complex traits - such as personality and intelligence - which feeds his convenient skepticism as regards the genetic component of their heritability.

The book's real agenda emerges in its calls for stringent regulation, its subtext tinged with suspicion both of scientific inquiry and individual autonomy. By invoking a static, nebulous and absolute "shared humanity" as the foundation of morality, Fukuyama unwittingly empowers the very state he claims to fear, entrusting it with the delicate task of policing human evolution. Sadly, this is what reactionary looks like, dressed in moderate, progressive clothes.

Such politically-convenient triangulation ignores the vast ethical complexities of biotechnological advancements, reducing them to a convenient bogeyman that justifies increased state control. That would be self-defeating for any state which unilaterally tried it. One thinks of the calls for unilateral nuclear disarmament echoing across the decades.

"Our Posthuman Future" may have sparked conversations at the margins two decades ago, but its attempt to impose an absolute Platonic morality on the contingent protocols of an evolved social primate is just an empty exercise in reification.