THE ILLUSIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND THE PROSPECT OF HUMAN EXTINCTION

In the context of resistances to the historical 'blows' to 'human self-love' enumerated by Sigmund Freud (Copernicus decentering the Earth; Darwin removing the barrier between humans and animals; his own efforts in showing how the unconscious subverts the supposed mastery of the conscious ego), Jacques Lacan's early formulations and probings on the topic of subjectivity in his second seminar include, in a not uncharacteristic, but yet somewhat bizarre, digression, an envisionment of 'science fiction' involving the extinction of the entire human population and a recording device which continues to operate following the event. Specifically, Lacan questions what consequences this has for our understandings of consciousness (including subsequent philosophical objections); what status the recording instrument would possess; and what a repopulating society would make of the recorded materials once they had learnt to access and interpret them. In exploring this scenario, along with what Lacan describes as his 'materialist definition of the phenomenon of consciousness', we will begin to appreciate how the notion of the human becomes a psychical assemblage pieced together to experience a fragile unity. Relatedly, the human species will historically be seen to have carried with it, and continually reinforced, certain fundamental prejudices: cosmological, biological and psychological. What the 'limit' example of extinction will make clear is the extent to which the material world affects the human 'prerogatives' of self-preservation and self-interest. What is called for is the overcoming of historical preconceptions along with the forms of domination they are invariably coupled with. Recent discussions of extraterrestrial colonization will be seen then to be mere compensatory narratives which ultimately obfuscate the very real and urgent--need to rethink our misguided sense of 'control'. Does the ultimately destructive (and in some respects irreversible) course engaged in vis-a-vis Earth's natural environment due to this form of universalized narcissism--necessarily need to be countered with the prospect of humankind's own obliteration in order for change to occur? KEYWORDS: Lacan; Freud; Consciousness; Extinction