An old family friend of mine who enjoys playing Internet village atheist on Facebook often expresses his great hope to see his consciousness someday uploaded into cyberspace and to live out the ages in a virtual paradise of his own devising.

Where St. Francis referred to his body with affectionate severity as “Brother Ass,” my friend uses the phrase “stupid apes” to disparage human existence in its living, breathing corporeality, its bodily existence. For him, it seems, the whole business of flesh, blood and bones, of nerves, muscle and skin, of appetites, instincts and emotions — the very stuff of human existence — appear as a disposable and indeed rather discreditable first stage in a multistage rocket.

Read the article “‘Brother Ass’ or ‘Stupid Apes’? Transhumanism, the Imago Dei and Hollywood” on ncregister.com.