Ayn Rand and the Posthuman

Ayn Rand and the Posthuman is a study of the American novelist’s relationship with twenty-first-century ideas about technology. Rand wrote science fiction that has inspired Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, politicians, and economists. Ben Murnane demonstrates Rand’s connection to, and impact on, those with a “posthuman” vision, in which human and machine merge. The text examines the philosophical intersections between Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism and posthumanism, and Rand’s influence on transhumanism, a major branch of posthumanist thought. The book further investigates Rand’s presence and portrayal in various examples of posthumanist science fiction, including Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda , popular videogame BioShock , and Zoltan Istvan’s novel The Transhumanist Wager . Considering Rand’s influence from a cultural, political, technological, and economic perspective, this study throws light on an under-documented but highly significant aspect of Rand’s legacy.