"Asceticism" is kind of a loaded word in this context since there's a big difference between ancient and modern renunciations of nature. The ancient kind was onerous, to say the least, because there was no high technology to pick up the slack.

Think of the consumers in the movie WALL-E. Are they ascetics? They're hedonists, it seems, so they're not exactly suffering. But they're not animals either, acting in natural, instinctive ways. They're more like those who are dependent on technology, plugged into the Matrix (in The Matrix movies).

A question I raise with transhumanism (which isn't exactly asceticism) is whether technology is forcing us to detach from the wilderness in all its forms, including, therefore, from the human body and its impulses. The more cognitive science and biotechnology enable us to modify ourselves, the more artificial we'll be. Even if we keep pursuing pleasure at that point, we'll have renounced our naturally selected role. Is that asceticism or transhumanism, or do they overlap in some ways?