Could the development of ars technica (the art of technology) be made to fit into a framework that would not only reflect the technological progress made by humanity so far, but also be reasonably accurate at predicting our future as a species? Of course, one could argue that anything can fit into a framework, provided you tweak the framework enough to reach whichever conclusion you aim for. But sophism aside, is there some predictability to be derived from the history of mankind’s command of technology? Here are five proposed stages of technological development.

The first is when a species is subject to its environment. Think of prehistorical times up to the lower paleolithic period, when the Homo and the Australopithecines species roamed the Earth; their mortality rate was high and acutely sensitive to environmental factors such as the weather, scarceness of food sources, competition with other predatorial species, etc. Hominids of that time were, for all practical purposes, passively dependent on the mood swings of nature and fate for their survival. We shall call this the “dependency stage“.

The second is when mankind started controlling its own survival. The discovery of fire, in particular, allowed for greater control over predatory animals, a seat at the top of the food chain, and constant warmth; similarly, the development of agricultural techniques allowed man to achieve relative self-sufficiency; he started to control his own destiny to a significantly greater degree, but not yet that of other species. We shall call this the “self-reliance stage“.

Then came the bronze age and, centuries later, the industrial revolution, which allowed mankind to control its environment. Not only were humans able to further control their own destiny, they also started shaping their environment, triggering a period of unprecedented expansion of their earthly footprint, both in breadth (land and sea occupation) and depth (of environmental transformation). With these technological developments, of course, came the woes of pollution and other nefarious impacts for the other species, and for the whole planet as a habitat for all things living. While we may be aware of these adverse impacts (as we are today), we are capable of mitigating them at best but not yet reversing them and producing more positive externalities than negative ones. We shall call this the “fruition stage“.

The fourth stage is when humans start engineering both their environment and their own selves. They no longer impact the ecosystem as a (usually detrimental) byproduct of their technological development, but actually think into ways of improving our habitat and making our sophisticated lifestyles sustainable, not only for our benefit but that of all species. Similarly, this is the stage where technology allows us to shape our biological destiny, substituting evolutionary randomness for engineering of the human body to be more resilient and better suited to a wider variety of future-relevant purposes. Notions such as wildlife conservation, renewable energy, geoengineering, DNA engineering, implants, nanotechnology, etc. are no longer technological novelties or cutting-edge buzzwords but are universally mastered and consistently embedded in the fabric of our society. These characteristics belong to what we shall call the “integration stage“.

The fifth stage is the logical application of this full technological command of our environment and our own selves beyond our earthly habitat – namely, to space, starting with the Moon, Mars and artifical orbiting ecosystems and further expanding as far as space travel technologies will allow. This is the “swarm stage“.

Considering our current capabilities and the problems that we are facing in the first quarter of the XXIst century, this author thinks that mankind is nearing the last throes of the fruition stage; although whether closing this particular chapter will take a few decades or more is a matter of speculation. We are becoming increasingly aware of the impact that our development and growth as a species is having on the habitat that we share with millions of others. This, in turn, gives rise to a global conscience about the need to address sustainability issues, and drives the development of technologies geared towards the conservation of our habitat in ways that yet continue to benefit mankind. This is where win-win technologies, that benefit human development as well as Earth as a whole (or at least, that does not harm it) start coming to life: renewable energy, smart materials, biological agriculture, the rise of digital information as a valuable resource with a beneficial footprint, etc.

Where does this fit in the transhumanist roadmap? If one can consider that transhumanism is god-like control over the condition and development of mankind as a species, then it obviously has its place in the integration stage and beyond: a time when humans stop riding shotgun and start driving for the better the common destiny of all things living on Earth and beyond; in addition to having complete control over their own bodies and minds, free at last from the material conditions that drives unwanted suffering and mortality.