While I never met Manley, I was naturally curious about his suicide, because like me, he ended up at the newspaper I once worked. He walked the same newsroom floor, spoke the same slang like JOCO (for the Johnson, Kansas, County Office), and probably chatted with some of the same reporters I used to hang with. That connection made his Aug. 15 suicide something I immediately wanted to find out more about.

The second reason Manley’s death interested me is because of its transhumanist connections. First and foremost, Manley’s suicide received such extensive news coverage not because he was a particularly famous journalist, but because of how he executed his death. Manley, for all intents and purposes, uploaded his life to a website prior to killing himself. As transhumanists often look at ways of technological preservation of the human mind, I found it interesting that Manley attempted this with the only technology he had: the world wide web. He pre-paid his site for five years and urged his relatives to keep it up indefinitely. The site chronicles his life, marriages, favorite trips, musical tastes, attempts at organ donation, and reasons for committing suicide.

Manley’s site hints at transhumanist leanings for longevity. He declared, “I didn't want to die. If I could have waved a magic wand and lived for 200 years, I would have.” His site, which he spent the year prior to his suicide making, says Manley did not kill himself because he was tired of living, but because he felt he could not live well for much longer. Manley said he was suffering early signs of dementia and didn’t want to become completely witless and have to rely on others for his care.

Finally, Manley’s suicide brought transhumanism to my mind because I read Dan Brown’s novel Inferno earlier this year. In it, Brown’s villain is a transhumanist who believes that goals of human life extension are prevailing, but that humans won’t be able to take advantage of extended lifespans due to overpopulation depleting the planet’s resources. Brown’s villain proposes a radical idea to deal with overpopulation (I’ll let you read the book to find out what it is). If you take at face value Brown’s contention that transhumanists are concerned with overpopulation, then Manley’s solution -- suicide -- would be one way to deal with that problem.

To be fair, the idea of suicide as a population control measure, has been around for a long time. In certain cultures, it was accepted that the old should simply fade away and die to make room for the young and thriving. In Japan, the “Suicide Forest” is littered with the bodies of those who've chosen it as their place to die.

Suicide is an issue that draws strong opinions. There are mental health advocates who contend that suicide is always a sign of mental health problems. There are right-to-die advocates who will argue that people can be perfectly rational and decide to end their lives.

For his part, Manley said he was not depressed. In news coverage following his death, Manley’s friends and family also said he did not appear depressed. Let’s assume that Manley was accurate in his mental health self assessment: he suffered no depression or mental health problems. Let’s also assume that Manley’s approach is a good one in a society where the normal population controls of disease and old age don’t adequately winnow the population. Is it ethical to simply let people choose to die? And if it is, how does society ensure that only people who are mentally healthy are choosing to do this? Would people who actually are depressed die, and society just not care because society needs more room? Would people who deserve the benefit of mental health expertise just be cast aside? The people who, arguably, are most in need of help because their own mental distress is stopping them from helping themselves, would be most vulnerable in this situation.

Going beyond the mentally ill, would those who are sick and dying also be encouraged to commit suicide? There are people now who wish to end their life prematurely when facing debilitating illnesses or conditions. In a society where suicide is population management, would those people be encouraged to thrown in the towel early?

Lastly, in a transhumanist society, where the ultimate goal is extended life, a post-human body, would suicide fly? Or would it just go too much against the grain of achieving post-human endeavors?

Certainly I don’t have all the answers, but certainly Martin Manley’s death has led me to pose the questions.