Transhumanism

The 2230s are generally accepted as the start of the genetic revolution, sometimes called the genespree. During this decade, major pharmaceutical conglomerates took advantage of a severe lack of industry oversight to begin marketing branded, genetically modified babies to the public. In most cases, a genome template could be applied to a parent, ensuring that their child was born with all the marketed traits. Occasionally, these offspring would have to be lab cultivated. These offspring were products in themselves and therefore fit into easily identifiable, artificially designed genomes. A company would often have a signature genome, touted in the public sphere and marketed as the next step for a particular niche of society. Having a family of a particular brand of human was exclusive and a sign of prestige and wealth, especially knowing that all of their descendants would be a superior, improved form of humanity. In some cases, those modified children could eventually have children of their own. Those offspring too would be subjected to the company that designed their genes. This was the business plan for the entire industry as the 2240s and 50s proceeded.

But it was not to be. As the industry grew and a greater number and variety of transhuman genomes flooded human space, three significant issues began to surface.

Commercially dependent genotypes were recognized by many to be a form of corporate servitude or slavery, bending one’s life to the will of a private entity, especially for servicing or medical care. To be born as the product of a company was to agree to a terms of use, to have only augmentation as approved by that company and to uphold market-based appearance standards. It was increasingly difficult for any one government to throttle the power of these transnational genome designing companies.

The second issue was that each of these genome templates was, essentially, a new species of human, primed to reproduce and expand into space, diversifying the descendants of Earth beyond anything recognizable. To some, this was a terrifying possibility, though typically not a concern of those who were themselves diversifying the baseline. The dilution of humanity seemed inevitable given the rate at which these genomes were appearing and upgrading. For a moment in the 2260s, it was an issue that seemed ready to politically divide the Sol system.

The third, and most strategic concern for primarily baseline factions, was that transhuman templates were rapidly approaching the point where they would threaten baseline society. People might soon be living for multiple centuries, living in vacuum or other extreme environments. New resources and advantages were about to become available to the transhuman sects that would not benefit baseline humanity. One of the chief concerns, especially for the RFW, was that these transhuman factions might even recolonize portions of old Earth. Leading up to the 2270s, Luna was quite literally preparing military enforcement action against some of the corporate entities in the outer solar system.

So it was that in 2276, amidst the falling out of the RFW and the thousand states of the outer solar system, a resolution was made. Enforceable by military action by any party, the Tichordia Concord established a curb to genetic development. Dozens of project lines were cancelled. Many genomes were considered too well established to simply end production, especially those that could reproduce on their own. Therefore, the Tichordia Concord established a baseline for 74 transhuman subspecies with a “right to social establishment.” Per the agreement between all major solar system parties, these species had a right to procreation, specialized healthcare and freedom from commercial servitude. It was simultaneously the emancipation and hamstring of the transhuman revolution, and a founding event for the sprawling Kuiper Alliance.

Why design these genomes?

• Essentially every single commercial genome was an effort to design disease and aging out of the human body. Individual genome projects pursued other, sometimes more exotic objectives, but core to the philosophy was that a commercial genome needed to be an improvement upon the evolutionary norm in order to be competitive.

Can anyone just turn themselves into one of these genetically modified people?

• No. The level of modification required cannot be applied to a developed human. These people are redesigned from ground up. The genetic coding is applied to a parent, then the child gestates normally. If the genome is incapable of this process, they are gestated in lab conditions. The ultimate goal of every company was to produce a self-replicating genome, but not every product line reached that level of development before the gene freeze.

Why so colorful? Why would someone want a blue or a green designer baby?

• Why would someone want a red car? A stylish outfit? A new piece of tech? The designer baby industry was explosively profitable in the late twenty-third century. Scores and scores of companies poured fantastic amounts of money into a genetic product that could survive in a competitive market. Aesthetics were screened extensively as marketing teams tried to determine what the next hyper-human was going to look like. Why pay for a blue baby? Because there truly was no greater display of wealth and legacy than holding that easily recognizable, disease-free, high-tech superhuman. It was a symbol of status. The next must have. Your descendants would be proud to be blue!

Okay but what about all those pointed ears?

• An aesthetic trend after the 2260s. That trend has more or less solidified into a widely accepted trait. After a century of tapered eared humans, hardly anyone thinks differently about it. In many cases, larger ears act as natural radiators or make some subtle modification to baseline hearing. They certainly weren’t designed with headgear in mind. Several species have special cartilage that allows the ears to be bent.

What about all the reptilian nostrils?

• Another very common trait in hyper-human design. Baseline humanity didn’t evolve to live in low gravity environments, so most genomes were designed with improved sinuses and nostrils that would prevent congestion and inflammation, which was known to afflict humans in low gravity.

Same with the eyes?

• Yes. Human eyes suffered all sorts of irreversible effects in low gravity environments. Nearly all transhuman genomes incorporate biosynthetic eyes that are designed to accommodate all gravitational environments.

Androgyny seems to be a common theme.

• Yes. A lot of genomes were designed to be sexually monomorphic. There were many reasons for this. It was easier and cheaper to design in some cases. The public appetite for aesthetics was also trended towards androgyny in the mid to late 2200s.

Do these transhumans reproduce?

• It varies from species to species. If they were capable of reproduction at the time of the gene freeze, then they remain so today. But many species were not yet developed enough at the time. Today, those species have to maintain the facilities to continue making their kin. This sacred process plays deeply into the transhuman-centric culture of the Kuiper Alliance. For example, if an Ajax II (a species incapable of reproduction) wanted to have a child, they would have to petition of Tichordia Concord to have one made at the Ajax production facility on Haumae, at the expense of the Concord itself.