The 2016 election has for a long time been clouded with Donald's Trump's outrageous comments, or the showdown between Hillary and Bernie, we've often forgotten about some of the smaller third party candidates that are running. Some third party candidates would make excellent presidents, some are completely outrageous, and others are terrifying. Zoltan Istvan is the Transhumanist Party's candidate this year, the party's ideas come straight from science fiction and are bizarre to say the least.
To start at the beginning the Transhumanist Party was founded in October 2014 by philosopher and futurist Zoltan Istvan based on the ideas that America should use Science and Technology as the basis of our society, and that we should use science and technology to further human lifespan and promote health and wellness. The party wants to extend the human lifespan, and they want to use science and technology to do it.
Now initially Istvan's policies seem great except for the fact that some of the things he talks about sound straight out of science fiction such as the creation of as he puts it future advanced sapient beings, in other words robots, and cyborgs. The party also wants to use science and technology to help humans be more better off, whether how technology would be used was not specified, but one could only wonder how much of our body could be augmented with the transhumanist party's ideas.
Some Transhumanist ideas are actually really great such as restarting the space program and ending the costly war on drugs. Istvan even wants to promote green technology, these are all ideas that would really impact America positively, yet there are just a few more things that make the Transhumanist Party something scarier.
In his attempt to limit violent crime, and to further save American lives, Zoltan wants to implant chips into all American Citizens brains to reduce domestic violence, and to alert authorities to violent crimes and to those in need.
Now this idea sounds straight out of 1984, by putting governmentally regulated chips into civilians one couldn't even begin to fathom the things that could be done to American citizens. We could be tracked, we could be killed, a chip in the brain just screams George Orwell.
Lastly, the main factor that has lead many to turn away in horror from the Transhumanist party is the fact that the party campaigns around America in a bus made to look like a giant casket. The bus deemed the immortality bus is the mobile campaign headquarters of the party, the bus travels around america spreading the word about the curable disease known as aging.
Now the Transhumanist Party may have some decent progressive ideas but brain chips and giant coffins are just too much for me. Zoltan Istvan seems like he means well but should really tone down his science fiction if he seeks to make a serious bid at the White House.
