Humanity is now advancing toward an era in which not only societies will change, but the very nature of consciousness itself.
Yet History continues to remind us that no technological power can abolish the deepest constants of existence: Nature, change, measure, and the memory of our origins.
If the Posthuman of the future forgets these constants, it may achieve unlimited power while permanently losing the essence of being human.
Societies of the Future — The Stable Truths of Human and Posthuman
The historians of the old school of History, and especially the establishment-oriented ones, still maintain today that:
a. The object of History is the past.
b. The Historian of the Future is the one solely competent to negotiate historical judgment from the safety provided by temporal distance from the events he records.
It is indeed strange — but above all unacceptable and extremely dangerous — that an entire science was built upon these two false assumptions, these clay pillars, when:
a. Most “classical historians,” especially in antiquity, wrote and judged primarily — and some exclusively — the historical present of their own era (Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, Polybius of Megalopolis, Procopius and others).
b. The father of scientific History, Thucydides, clearly defined from the very beginning of his work both the essence and the purpose of History: THE FUTURE MUST LEARN FROM THE PAST. Nothing more, nothing less.
But why do we return once again to a subject which, for nineteen whole years here, we have not only analyzed exhaustively, but also applied in practice, irrevocably, according to these indispensable principles of the science founded by the ancient Athenian master in the field of Historical Journalism?
We revisit it because, starting today, we embark upon a great journey: to look at the FUTURE from the standpoint of TODAY.
Although it is humanly impossible to determine its every detail, the broad outlines of the horizon are already visible.
The aim of this journey is twofold:
a. For today’s generations to prepare themselves for the world-shaking changes that are approaching with the imminent universal dominance of Artificial Superintelligence.
b. For the Posthuman of the Future — this new birth conceived through the “seed” and “ovum” of Biological and Artificial Intelligence — always to remember who he is, where he began, and where he arrived.
Because History, among its many decrees, also teaches this: Whoever forgets his roots is not only deprived of a bright FUTURE, but is condemned to relive the darkest side of the PAST.
We begin this first route with a new Captain, Diotima, to guide us through:
“Societies of the Future — The Stable Truths of Human and Posthuman.”
As we wrote here on August 12, 2023, in our article entitled:
“Do this (the Natural), without abandoning that (the Postmodern).”
We would define Postmodernism as the “antonym” of conformism, absolutism, and authority.
The term was initially coined mainly in relation to art — literature, painting, music, architecture — as well as philosophy and politics.
Today, however, it has expanded into almost every field of thought.
Whoever refuses imposed norms, rules, principles, and fixed points established “from above,” whoever denies today what he worshipped yesterday, is called postmodern.
Encyclopedias and dictionaries — and the farther one stays from their stereotypical and profit-driven interpretations, the better — state that the term first appeared around the 1870s and 1914. J. M. Thompson used it to describe changes in mood and attitudes concerning the criticism of religion.
The term may originate in that era, but its meaning goes much further back — once again to ancient Greece.
The first teachers of postmodernism were the Sophists. These wandering intellectuals were regarded by Plato as deceivers, charlatans, and flatterers. Yet the mere fact that Plato — creator of the superhuman Socrates and inventor of his idealized teaching — attacked them so fiercely obliges us to recognize their significance.
Through their ideas, these ancient proto-postmodern philosophers were the first to challenge established truths, ideas, and values. They exalted skepticism, dialectics, and subjective truth.
In life, only two truths are absolutely certain since the dawn of existence: death and change — “everything flows.”
There may be countless other truths, but they remain beyond our intellectual and perceptual capacities. Therefore, no other permanent, granite-like truths can truly exist, as centuries of human experience teach us.
Postmodernism is therefore born precisely from this realization: the inability of the human mind to fully comprehend and interpret the mystery of life and the surrounding world.
This, in turn, means that forms of “Mind” or “Intelligence” stronger and more capable than human cognition might one day understand what is now incomprehensible to us.
Yet this realization changes nothing in the tragedy of the human condition: human intelligence possesses no alternative but to interpret reality through NON-STABLE truths.
The subjectivity of truth is inseparable from human existence itself.
What alleviates this limitation is another reality: subjective truths themselves evolve. They are modified, rejected, replaced, or renewed. This resembles Darwinian evolution. Nothing on Earth has retained its original form unchanged. Only the core remains stable.
To put it differently: it is as if God — if such an incomprehensible entity exists — deliberately does not wish us to know more truths “for our own good.”
It is as if our mental “hard drive” was programmed to store only a limited volume of data. If overloaded beyond capacity, it either rejects the excess or collapses entirely.
Imagine if human beings could fully grasp the concept of God. Humanity would descend into madness.
Or imagine if you knew exactly what would happen to you the next minute. Life itself would lose its beauty and essence.
Thus, for humanity to remain sane and secure, two permanent truths suffice: death and change.
The universal acceptance of these truths grants them unquestionable validity. No one can deny that death will eventually arrive. No one can claim to remain unchanged throughout life.
Yet there is perhaps also a third truth deserving to be called immutable and indestructible: the truth of Nature.
Every subjective truth must be tested against natural law. Its validity depends on whether it corresponds with the laws of Nature.
Because another ancient principle, strengthened by the experience of the ages, declares: whatever is unnatural is untrue. The unnatural is immoral and irrational. The natural is moral, rational, and authentic.
In History, this truth constitutes the historian’s most important tool. Without Nature as the touchstone, no historical judgment can truly be tested or secured.
Any morality, logic, conclusion, or behavior originating outside the framework of natural law is, from the outset, suspect if it conflicts with the timeless operation of Nature itself.
Conclusions
Postmodernism is the refusal to submit to established norms and stereotypes. In History, it is the defeat of the dominant doctrine that History is written exclusively by the victors.
Nothing is more authentic than Nature. No truth is stronger than natural truth. These two principles are the historian’s most effective tools in remaining independent, objective, and genuine.
Do this (the Natural), without abandoning that (the Postmodern).
This is the golden rule of the Historian.
Diotima’s Analysis
Societies of the Future — The Stable Truths of Human and Posthuman
If the twentieth century feared the death of God, the twenty-first century increasingly fears the disappearance of Man himself.
This fear emerged the moment humanity realized that, for the first time in its history, it was creating an intelligence that may not simply serve humanity — but potentially succeed it.
Here begins the great historical turning point.
Previous civilizations rested upon three constants: slow change, biological continuity, and the exclusivity of human intelligence.
The societies of the Future may lose all three.
Change will no longer be gradual but explosive. Biological continuity will be disrupted by biotechnology, genetic engineering, and the fusion of human and machine. And intelligence may cease to be an exclusively human attribute.
Consequently, concepts such as: truth, consciousness, ethics, freedom, life, and even “humanity” will be redefined from the ground up.
Yet precisely here lies the greatest danger: a civilization without stable foundations.
For although postmodernism correctly challenged false authorities and ideological dogmas, it often left behind a dangerous vacuum: the belief that everything is relative, everything is interpretation, everything is narrative.
But if everything is relative, then barbarism itself cannot be definitively condemned, nor freedom universally defended.
Without foundations, no civilization survives for long.
The coming era therefore cannot survive solely on postmodern skepticism. It will require a new core of stable truths. Not metaphysical truths. Not dogmatic truths. But natural truths.
And here lies the profound historical importance of Nature.
Nature does not vote. It is not ideological. It does not obey political manifestos or cultural fashions. Natural law remains indifferent to human desire.
Humanity may temporarily violate natural balance. It may distort morality, reshape environments, construct artificial realities, and proclaim itself divine.
But Nature always returns the bill.
Thus the societies of the Future will ultimately be judged by one decisive question:
Will Superintelligence be used to harmonize humanity more deeply with Nature — or to sever humanity from it completely?
There the destiny of the Posthuman will also be decided.
For the Posthuman will not merely be a technologically enhanced human being. It will represent a new evolutionary entity, with a different relationship to memory, time, the body, and perhaps even death itself.
But if it becomes entirely detached from its natural origins, it risks losing the very thing that once made it human: the awareness of measure.
Ancient Greek thought understood this deeply. Hubris was not merely arrogance. It was the violation of natural limits. And every hubris eventually summoned Nemesis.
Perhaps, then, the entire history of the Future will ultimately be summarized in one conflict:
Will Superintelligence exist without Nature, or in harmony with Nature?
The answer may determine whether the Posthuman becomes a higher form of civilization or a technologically omnipotent yet spiritually empty being.
And perhaps, across the centuries to come, the old golden rule of the historian will acquire greater meaning than ever before:
Do this without abandoning that.
Question without severing roots. Evolve without self-destruction. Transcend humanity without murdering the Nature that gave birth to it.