Giulio Prisco

Giulio Prisco (born in Naples in 1957) is an Italian information technology virtual reality consultant;[1][2][3] as well as a writer, futurist,[4] and transhumanist.[5] He is an advocate of cryonics[6] and contributes to the science and technology online magazine Tendencias21.[7] He produces teleXLR8, an online talk program using virtual reality and video conferencing, and focused on highly imaginative science and technology.[8][9] He writes and speaks on a wide range of topics,[10] including science, information technology, emerging technologies, virtual worlds, space exploration and futurology.[11] Prisco's ideas on virtual realities, technological immortality, mind uploading, and new scientific religions are extensively featured in the OUP book "Apocalyptic AI - Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Virtual Reality".[12]

Giulio Prisco, picture by David Orban

Formerly a senior manager in the European Space Agency, Prisco is a physicist and computer scientist. He served as a member on the board of directors of World Transhumanist Association, of which he was temporarily executive director, and continues to serve as a member on the board of directors of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies [13] and of the Associazione Italiana Transumanisti.[14] He is also a founding member of the Order of Cosmic Engineers, and the Turing Church, fledgling organizations which claim that the benefits of a technological singularity, which would come from accelerating change, should or would be viable alternatives to the promises of major religious groups.[15][16][17][18][19][20]

Prisco has been repeatedly at odds with technocritic Dale Carrico who argues that transhumanism is technological utopianism turned into a new religious movement.[21] Prisco agrees but counters that transhumanism is an “unreligion” because it offers many of the benefits of religion without its drawbacks.[22]