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Widespread concern over threats that pose an existential risk to the entire human species has provoked increasing attention and commitment to religious views of digital technology. These apocalyptic expectations of a glorious new digital world draw on American Christianity and play a visible role in tech culture and public life. The reshaping of traditional religions into new, but parallel, technological religions is characterized by a triple transformation of humanity into machines, machines into gods, and the universe into a cosmic and cosmically meaningful computer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The visibility of transhumanism in pop culture reveals its dramatic advance in twenty‐first‐century life. The more widespread the movement becomes, the more important it is to consider how transhumanism might be made relevant to global humanity. This article orients technological progress by drawing transhumanism into conversation with minjung theology from Korea. Minjung theology offers global tech culture—and its pursuit of technological salvation—an ethical foundation through attention to Han (an emotion specific to those who suffer from individual, sociopolitical, economic, and cultural oppression but have been unable to express it adequately) and the lived reality of those who are often excluded from benefits of technological society. Working in the other direction, transhumanist perspectives on technology offer minjung theology an opportunity to expand its reach through the development of a transcendent theological perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.2010.01146.x Byline: Robert M. Geraci (1) Keywords: artificial intelligence; Ray Kurzweil; Hans Moravec; religion; robotics; science; Singularity University; transhumanism Abstract: Abstract The belief that computers will soon become transcendently intelligent and that human beings will 'upload' their minds into machines has become ubiquitous in public discussions of robotics and artificial intelligence in Western cultures. Such beliefs are the result of pervasive Judaeo-Christian apocalyptic beliefs, and they have rapidly spread through modern pop and technological culture, including such varied and influential sources as Rolling Stone, the IEEE Spectrum, and official United States government reports. They have gained sufficient credibility to enable the construction of Singularity University in California. While different approaches are possible (and, indeed, are common in Japan and possibly elsewhere), this particular vision of artificial intelligence and robotics has gained ground in the West through the influence of figures such as Hans Moravec and Ray Kurzweil. Because pop-science books help frame public discussion of new sciences and technologies for individuals, corporations, and governments alike, the integration of religious and technoscientific claims made by their authors should be clear and open for public and scientific debate. As we move forward into an increasingly robotic future, we should do so aware of the ways in which a group's religious environment can help set the tone for public acceptance and use of robotic technologies. Author Affiliation: (1)Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Manhattan College, Bronx, NY 10471; e-mailrobert.geraci@manhattan.edu.

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.2007.00883.x Byline: Robert M. Geraci (1) Keywords: artificial intelligence; Isaac Asimov; Philip K. Dick; film; Anne Foerst; William Gibson; literature; movies; religion; robotics; science fiction; theology Abstract: Abstract In science-fiction literature and film, human beings simultaneously feel fear and allure in the presence of intelligent machines, an experience that approximates the numinous experience as described in 1917 by Rudolph Otto. Otto believed that two chief elements characterize the numinous experience: the mysterium tremendum and the fascinans. Briefly, the mysterium tremendum is the fear of God's wholly other nature and the fascinans is the allure of God's saving grace. Science-fiction representations of robots and artificially intelligent computers follow this logic of threatening otherness and soteriological promise. Science fiction offers empirical support for Anne Foerst's claim that human beings experience fear and fascination in the presence of advanced robots from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology AI Lab. The human reaction to intelligent machines shows that human beings in many respects have elevated those machines to divine status. This machine apotheosis, an interesting cultural event for the history of religions, may-despite Foerst's rosy interpretation-threaten traditional Christian theologies. Author Affiliation: (1)Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Manhattan College, Riverdale, NY 10471; e-mailrobert.geraci@manhattan.edu.

Technical achievement in laboratories requires millennia-old ritual formulations; the methodological expectations and presuppositions of scientists stem not only from investigations of the last three centuries but also from the ritual knowledge making that has governed human religion. Laboratory research is a form of human ritual open to interpretation in the manner of religious ritual. The experiments of the laboratory are fact-gathering ventures, but the integration of that knowledge into our general understanding of a universe of information networks is the process of knowledge making, and it is the highest achievement of all rituals, be they religious or scientific. Ritual theory offers insight into the nature of scientific experimentation. Keywords: constructivism; experimental science; experimentation; knowledge making; information networks; internal realism; laboratory; pragmatic realism; quasi objects; realism; ritual theory; scientific advancement.