MARK O'CONNELL is Slate's books columnist, a staff writer at The Millions, and a regular contributor to The New Yorker's "Page-Turner" blog; his work has been published in The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, The Observer, and The Independent.
**Winner of the 2018 Wellcome Book Prize**
**Shortlisted for the 2017 Baillie-Gifford Prize for
Nonfiction**
**Finalist for the 2017 Royal Society Insight Investment Science
Book Prize** "Troubling and humorous, this is one of my current
give-it-to-everyone books--I buy six copies at a time. Did you know
our future belongs to a few asocial geeks for whom being human has
always been a problem? Now they can solve it!"
--Jeanette Winterson, Vulture "O'Connell... dissects the practices
and beliefs of trans-humanism with extraordinary exuberance and
wit... To Be a Machine is sometimes hilarious (triggering several
bursts of uncontrollable giggles while I read it on the Tube) but
even as O'Connell mocks the more absurd manifestations of
trans-humanism he shows sympathy and understanding for its
adherents."
--Financial Times "Wryly humorous, cogently insightful.... To Be a
Machine is a lucid, soulful pilgrimage into the heart of what
humanity means to us now--and how science may redefine it tomorrow,
for better and for worse."
--NPR.org "Open-minded... With a practiced journalist's sense of
engagement and empathy leavened by healthy skepticism, O'Connell
describes the peculiar constellation of scientists, seekers,
grifters, and con artists orbiting techno-optimist communities over
the past half century.... Offer[s] much-needed critical analysis
that never veers into condescension."
--LA Review of Books "O'Connell unleashes his prodigious
researching and writing skills on what could be your future."
--Philadelphia Inquirer "O'Connell is a writer of elegant precision
and winning facetiousness... His ear and eye for detail are
prodigious... O'Connell's writing--full of high-low swerves and
personal asides--is a constant reminder of the bathetic reality of
being human."
--4Columns "[O'Connell] reveals a bounty of beguiling ingenuity and
genuine absurdity, eliciting laughs and empathy, because we are our
most human while trying to become something more than human."
--Playboy "O'Connell, a columnist for Slate, is a charming, funny
tour guide. Writing on transhumanism often gets swept away by the
inherent drama of its adherents' promises, but O'Connell's eye for
small human details...keeps the narrative grounded in a way that
rigorous scientific debunking wouldn't."
--Vice "The game-changing technology being developed in Silicon
Valley is often hard to wrap one's head around, and Mark O'Connell
takes readers on a wild ride through this world in a way that makes
one feel that anything is possible and everything is happening
right now."
--Newsweek "In this thoughtful and readable book, [O'Connell] aims
to understand the motivations of those who are guided by the belief
that technology will enable humans to transcend the human
condition. In an attempt to explore what it means to think of
ourselves as machines, O'Connell takes readers on an
all-encompassing tour...He writes in an agreeable, conversational
tone, offering his opinions, doubts, and fears along the way."
--Undark "O'Connell decides to dive into the transhumanist culture
in the best way possible: by traveling the world in search of key
figures in the movement... The result is a fast-paced
travel-log-cum-existential inquiry into the science and the
religious significance of this age-old human desire to live
forever: To become, in effect, a god."
--NPR's 13.7 blog "O'Connell, a journalist, makes his own
prejudices clear: 'I am not now, nor have I ever been, a
transhumanist, ' he writes. However, this does not stop him from
thoughtfully surveying the movement."
--Science "O'Connell's book is skeptical but not cynical, and it
functions as a witty overview of transhumanism."
--The Ringer "O'Connell's sensibility--his humanity, if you
will--and his subject matter are a match made in heaven. It's an
absolutely wonderful book."
--The Millions
"O'Connell has devised an indispensable GPS for negotiating today's
tomorrow-land."
--Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star "Comedic, unsettling, ambivalent,
and intriguing...O'Connell's book is a worthwhile read for all
audiences."
--LitHub "To Be a Machine is flat-out fascinating. O'Connell's
journey is a layman's adventure through the technological looking
glass, an opportunity to meet with a subculture existing on the
fringes of the tech scene and a compelling peek at one possible
future. Sharply-written and thought-provoking, To Be a Machine is a
book that will undoubtedly set your mind to racing and your gears
to turning."
--The Maine Edge "O'Connell writes with an intellectual curiosity
that makes his esoteric subject matter accessible to lay
readers...a stimulating overview of modern scientific realities
once thought to be the exclusive purview of science fiction."
--Publishers Weekly "An enlightening tour of transhumanism...
packed with eccentric characters...An unsettling but informative
and sometimes-optimistic view of mostly legitimate efforts at life
extension."
--Kirkus Reviews "Readers will appreciate O'Connell's sense of
humor and his fast-paced writing, and will at times feel like
they're having a dialogue with the author as he ponders the ethics,
consequences, and dilemmas of these transhumanist activities
embedded in society today. Those who are interested in artificial
intelligence, bioengineering, technology, and human development
will find this book to be deeply engrossing and informative on the
topic of transhumanism and what it means to be a human today and in
the future."
--Booklist "A very lively book about transhumanism."
--Sebastian Barry, The Guardian "A voyage into the dark heart of
transhumanism, where dwell many hopeful mind-uploaders,
robo-warfighters, subdermal implanters, doomed immortalists, and
sundry aging Singularitarians. A funny, wise, and oddly moving
book."
--Nicholson Baker, author of House of Holes and Human Smoke
"Hilarious and moving.... To Be a Machine is super-detailed and
cosmic and minute and high-stakes and funny and sad, all at the
same time."
--Elif Batuman, author of The Possessed
"O'Connell, like some dream combination of Jon Ronson and Don
Delillo, switches effortlessly from profound to poignant to
laugh-out-loud funny. A brilliant illumination of the
techno-future, To Be A Machine is also, and more importantly, a
joyful summation of what it is to be human."
--Paul Murray, author of Skippy Dies and The Mark and the Void
"O'Connell's forensic investigation of the unnervingly fluid border
between the human and the machine is elegant and gripping: at once
a hilarious anthropological survey of the people who believe
technology will give us eternal life and a terrifying account of
how technology is changing the cardinal features of human
existence."
--Olivia Laing, author of The Lonely City and The Trip to Echo
Spring "Provocative, funny and not a little gonzo, it's a great one
to recommend to devotees of Jon Ronson"
--Bookseller (UK)
"Mark O'Connell, in funny, reflective prose, finds in the
transhumanists a desire to exceed these very limits - of the
capacity for thought, of death, of the body."
--Globe and Mail (Canada) "[A] beautifully written book...
Ultimately, To Be A Machine is both an insight into transhumanist
thought and O'Connell's very relatable fears and anxieties about
morality and the future."
--Irish Times
"To Be a Machine is an attempt to understand the transhumanist
movement on its own terms... It's O'Connell's lack of stridency, as
well as his often splendid writing, that makes him such a
companionable guide."
--The Guardian (UK) "By exposing the ludicrous yet terrifyingly
serious ideologies behind transhumanism, To Be a Machine is an
important book, as well as a seriously funny one."
--Sunday Times (UK) "O'Connell invokes the twin spectres of death
and child-bearing in an attempt to make sense of his subject--but
he also manages to be staggeringly funny."
--New Scientist (UK) "[A] Homer's Odyssey for the digital age.... A
gentle, humorous and lovingly written book."
--The Times (UK)
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