Making Persons? Luther, Transhumanism, and the Limits of Human Specification

Abstract

In May 2026, NPR described an emerging market in polygenic embryo screening in which prospective parents can rank embryos not only by estimated disease risk but by predicted height, body mass index, longevity, intelligence, eye color, hair color, baldness, acne, and handedness. The practice gives an unusually concrete point of entry into the philosophical debate over transhumanism because it requires no speculative technology: the embryos already exist, the scores are already sold, and the choice concerns which embryo will be implanted. I use this case to test the strongest moral argument for enhancement and three major objections associated with Michael Sandel, Jürgen Habermas, Nicholas Agar, and Derek Parfit. I then argue that the deepest difficulty is an aporia concerning numerical identity, genuine transcendence of the human, and normative continuity. Model theory proves useful here, for rival structures can satisfy different portions of the transhumanist commitment set with the serious work beginning with admissibility and comparative adequacy rather than with satisfiability alone. Christian theology then introduces a different warrant for an extrinsic account of particularity grounded in divine address. Finally, I return to Luther's oeconomia and the three estates. Luther does not make the household a technology-free zone. While God institutes the oeconomia and entrusts its administration to human beings, spouse and children are described under a grammar of gift, reception, nurture, and governance. That distinction yields a narrower argument against preference-driven embryo optimization while leaving disease-focused selection for separate moral adjudication.