The future of human and humanity in the philosophy of Nick Bostrom

Abstract

The proposed research is devoted to understanding the content of the philosophical views of the transhumanist philosopher, futurologist, professor at the University of Oxford, co-founder of the World Transhumanist Association, director of the Institute for the Future of Humanity (Oxford University) N. Bostrom, whose works belong to the mainstream of Western philosophical thought, but have not yet gained wide popularity in the Kazakh academic community. The focus is on the philosopher’s ideas about the future of man and humanity, which are represented by transhumanist views and attempts to make predictions of the human and posthuman future, as well as the experience of N. Bostrom’s understanding of transhumanism as an intellectual phenomenon and social movement. The set research tasks are solved on the basis of the implementation of the principles of historical and logical, concreteness, and consistency. As a result of the analysis of the works of N. Bostrom, program documents of institutions in the organization of which he is involved, an array of philosophical texts of authors who are in controversy with the thinker, a systematic reconstruction of his views and activities is carried out. The research materials introduce the reader to the field of current philosophical discussions in the modern West. The analysis of the author’s texts undertaken in the article by N. Bostrom’s research on the future of man and humanity allows us to identify the peculiarities of his understanding of the nature of man and society, methods of forming a prognostic vision, possible global risks, as well as to comprehend the experience of N. Bostrom in reconstructing the history of transhumanism.

Key words: N. Bostrom, future, human, humanity, global risks, transhumanism, futurology.