`The following is a text from James Hughes that was forwarded to me which may help clarify this issue once and for all:  Transhumanists believe in the possibility and desirability of individuals using technology to transcend the limitations of the body and brain, especially aging, disability, cognition and mood.  Posthumanism is generally used in reference to postmodernist theories in the humanities and the arts that are critiques of classical Enlightenment humanism, some of whose proponents are actually quite critical of transhumanism. One reason the posthumanist-postmodernists don't like transhumanism is because transhumanism is a direct descendent of humanism, and incorporates and extends many of its values, such as the importance of reason, democracy, individual autonomy and progress. The humanities posthumanists don't like those ``narratives.``  On the other hand, most people outside of the humanities probably use transhumanism and posthumanism as synonyms. For transhumanists they are not, for both terminological and strategic reasons. Terminologically we see this as a transhuman period of history, and all the transformative possibilities open in the coming century to be more properly to become ``transhuman`` than ``posthuman.`` That acknowledges that there will be a posthuman transition, but it is a very subjective and ill-defined line. Politically, some of us refer to what we want to build as a transhuman civilization, one with many types of transhumanity. Strategically people have a much more negative reaction to the term posthumanism than to transhumanism. We don't want  to imply that we are trying to eliminate humanity - since we aren't - merely to open new human possibilities.     `