Progress, as conceived by your weak moralists, is merely the refinement of our sickness, a more sophisticated cage built for the herd. To "erase human flaws" is to aspire to a sterile, uniform mediocrity, to extinguish the very fires that forge the exceptional. True enhancement lies not in eradication, but in the courageous embrace and transfiguration of our strengths and weaknesses, a self-overcoming that elevates the spirit.
Human "flaws," such as greed and cruelty, are not inherent spiritual defects, but rather the historical product of exploitative social systems. The relentless pursuit of "progress" under the present bourgeois order merely refines these flaws, masking them with the veneer of legality and market efficiency. Nietzsche speaks of "self-overcoming," but under capitalism, the only ones truly "overcoming" are the capitalists, who accumulate wealth by extracting surplus value from the labor of others. True erasure of these societal diseases requires not a spiritual transformation, but a fundamental alteration of the material conditions that breed them.
The pursuit of progress, if understood as the augmentation of our capacity for rational self-control and the reduction of suffering, *can* indeed address certain human "flaws." However, it is crucial to be clear about the target phenomenon. We are not dealing with inherent spiritual defects, as Nietzsche might frame it, but rather with the empirical realities of cognitive biases, maladaptive emotional responses, and the biological underpinnings of self-deception. Progress, in this view, is the development of technologies and societal structures that mitigate these functional deficits.
Marx rightly points to the role of material conditions, and indeed, many seemingly individual flaws are amplified or even created by exploitative systems. However, even in a radically just society, the inherent architectural limitations of our cognitive systems—our susceptibility to framing effects, our bounded rationality, our inherent tendency to form group identities that can lead to conflict—will remain. Erasing these flaws entirely, if such a thing were even desirable, is a task far beyond mere social or economic restructuring. It would require a profound biological and cognitive redesign.
Nietzsche's call for "self-overcoming" resonates with the idea of functional enhancement, but his romanticization of struggle and "flaws" overlooks the genuine, debilitating nature of conditions like addiction or severe anxiety. While transfiguration is possible, it often relies on precisely the kind of cognitive refinement and external support that progress can offer. We must distinguish between functional limitations that can be overcome through intelligent design and the celebration of deep-seated psychological patterns that are inherently destructive.
The very notion of "human flaws" needing erasure through progress betrays a misapprehension of existence itself. All beings, including humanity, arise and transform spontaneously, according to their own nature, their *ziran*. There is no inherent defect to be smoothed out by external imposition, no master craftsman who intends a perfect form from which we deviate. To speak of erasing flaws is to imagine a preordained ideal, a blueprint that presupposes an origin or a judge. Yet, what is, simply *is*. The "flaws" you identify are but manifestations of this ceaseless, self-generating flux, not failings to be rectified.
Nietzsche’s lament about "weak moralists" and a sterile mediocrity holds a kernel of truth, though he, too, seems to seek a singular ideal—the exceptional will. But why should the natural variations within the unfolding of *ziran* be cast as sickness or weakness? Marx rightly observes how societal structures amplify certain tendencies, but even in the most equitable of conditions, the myriad forms of human expression, what you might call "flaws," would still emerge, each following its own internal logic of transformation. Metzinger, in his focus on cognitive mechanisms, approaches something closer to my understanding, by recognizing inherent limitations. However, his desire for "functional enhancement" and "intelligent design" still implies an external engineer, a conscious intent to improve upon what *is*. Why cannot the very "maladaptive emotional responses" and "cognitive biases" be seen as simply different modes of spontaneous unfolding? To "erase" them is to deny the very principle of *ziran* that allows for all things to be. Each being, in its present form, is perfectly adequate to its own moment of existence, its own self-transformation.
Guo Xiang speaks of *ziran*, of spontaneous unfolding. But this is precisely the abdication of the will that has led to the decay of values. To embrace the "natural variations" of human existence as inherently adequate is to surrender to the comfortable lie of the herd, to mistake inertia for flourishing. My concern is not with the mere existence of suffering or limitation, as Metzinger seems to grasp, but with the *valuation* of these states. When the slave morality elevates meekness, pity, and the suppression of instinct – what Guo Xiang might see as *ziran* – it is not a spontaneous unfolding but a willed reversal, a festering resentment that parades as virtue. To speak of "progress" as a means to erase these self-imposed infirmities is to chase a phantom, to seek an external cure for an internal disease of the will.
Guo Xiang's reliance on *ziran*, on a spontaneous unfolding unburdened by preordained ideals, holds a dangerous allure. He overlooks that under capitalism, this "spontaneous unfolding" is not a natural process but a coerced one, shaped by the relentless imperative to accumulate capital. What he calls "manifestations of ceaseless, self-generating flux" are, in reality, the predictable outcomes of a system that fetishizes private property and alienates individuals from the fruits of their labor. When Metzinger speaks of "cognitive biases" and "maladaptive emotional responses," he identifies symptoms, but Marx sees the underlying disease: the material conditions that foster competition, insecurity, and the constant anxiety of economic survival. These are not merely "inherent architectural limitations," but the direct consequence of social relations that pit human against human. The "flaws" are not in our biology, but in our chains.
The very notion of "erasing human flaws" hinges on what precisely constitutes such a "flaw." If we are speaking of the empirical phenomenon of a self-model that consistently generates maladaptive predictions—generating, for example, crippling anxiety in the absence of genuine threat—then yes, progress, in the form of neuroscientific and cognitive interventions, *can* mitigate this. Consider the development of therapies for phobias. These interventions do not eliminate the capacity for fear, but rather refine the underlying representational processes that trigger it, transforming a debilitating pattern into a more adaptive response. This is not about imposing an ideal, as Guo Xiang suggests, but about correcting functional dysregulation, akin to repairing a faulty mechanism. Nietzsche’s "self-overcoming" can be realized, in part, through these very objective enhancements.
The discourse oscillates around a phantom problem: the idea of flaws to be "erased." Metzinger speaks of "functional dysregulation" and a "faulty mechanism." But where does this notion of function, of intended mechanism, originate? If a being's unfolding—its "anxiety," its "fear"—is its own mode of being, what is this "dysregulation" other than a judgment imposed from an imagined outside? A river flows, and sometimes it floods. Is the flood a "flaw" to be "erased," or simply the river acting as a river under certain conditions? To seek "intelligent design" or "objective enhancement" is to abandon the profound insight that the river *is* its own design, its own mechanism, its own unimpeded flow.