The body electric in the age of virtual reality and transhumanism: Forces changing the West’s notions of self, identity and humanness

This article begins by exploring the relationships connecting Walt Whitman’s ‘body electric’, Marshall McLuhan’s ‘discarnate man [sic]’ and Neil Postman’s ‘citizen of technopoly’. It then examines the disruptive effects that electric technologies have had on western culture’s notions of ‘self’, ‘identity’ and particularly ‘the body’, especially the development of Virtual Reality systems, social networking and transhuman technologies over the past three decades. A survey of new wearable and immersive devices, advances in artificial intelligence, and invasive biotechnical procedures reveals increasingly questionable attempts to replace the human body by machines. These endeavours are supported, notably, by some of the world’s wealthiest investors in artificial intelligence and biotechnology, statesmen, media barons and members of the military – the forces of technopoly. The article concludes that, despite the efforts to replicate, improve or even replace it, the body is essential to our humanness.