A colour-blind artist has had an ‘eyeborg’ antenna implanted directly into his skull to allow him to ‘hear’ colors – and his girlfriend has had implants in her feet that allow her to ‘feel’ earthquakes.
The two are ‘transhumanists’, a growing movement of people who hope to add new abilities to their bodies using technology – with Elon Musk claiming that technology like his Neuralink implant could improve human memory or even allow humans to to live forever as a human-machine. hybrids.
The rapid evolution of artificial intelligence has sparked new interest in the idea of surgically modified humans.
In a new documentary out this year, Cyborg, Neil Harbisson, the world’s first legally recognized cyborg thanks to his color hearing implant, says: ‘This is happening!’ and hopes that technology will allow people to ‘design their own’ bodies.
The new film will be released later this year (First Born Films)
Neil Harbisson, the world’s first legally recognized cyborg thanks to his color hearing implant (First Born Films)
Hrbisson argues for ‘non-human’ identities (First Born Films)
Director Carey Born said she had heard of a “cyborg” who had been surgically modified to hear color. She emailed Harbisson and decided to make a documentary about “transhumanists” because she felt it was important that the technology didn’t fall into the wrong hands.
Born said, “Neil is completely color blind, so he wanted a sense of color, and talked to a technologist named Adam Montandon to create a device that translated color schemes into sound.”
‘He can hear colour: it has been tested.
‘There are quite a lot of people who don’t believe, but I definitely think it’s true. He designed it and decided how to align the frequencies with which colors. We explore that in the film because I find it fascinating.’
Born believes that technologies like Neuralink should spark a debate about transhumanism – otherwise technologies like brain implants will be dominated by billionaires, governments and the military.
“AI has developed at an extraordinary speed,” says Born. ‘The people around Neil are very interested in ‘biohacking’ and ‘grinding’. At the other end of the spectrum you have people like Elon Musk who are pioneering these ideas because they have the resources to do it.”
‘I think there is secret research going on behind closed doors. We’ve been talking about AI for twenty to thirty years, and how it will come. But now the time has come. It’s here.’
Musk’s Neuralink implanted a chip in a volunteer this year, and he has said he hopes the devices could lead to a future where people can “upload” their thoughts into machines.
Moon has an implant that allows her to ‘feel’ earthquakes (First Born Films)
In a post on thinking”.
Believers in ‘The Singularity’ hope for a day when humans and machines merge (which, according to former Google engineer Ray Kurzweil, could happen as early as 2045), turning humans into human-machine hybrids – and possibly granting them godlike powers are unlocked.
Transhumanistic experiments in which humans and machines merge will be the key to this, according to believers.
Musk himself has said that he believes “downloading” a human into a robot body could be possible. He said: ‘We can download the things that we think make us unique. Of course, when you’re no longer in that body, that’s definitely going to be a difference, but in terms of preserving our memories, our personalities, I think we could do that.”
Biohackers and ‘grinders’ (like some of Harbisson’s followers) prefer a do-it-yourself approach, often performing simple operations on themselves.
‘Grinders’ employ extreme body modification to enhance human capabilities – with ‘grinders’ having implanted everything from computer chips to a vibrating pelvic implant called the ‘Lovetron 9000’.
Body Hacker Amal Graafstra created a ‘smart gun’ that can only be activated when picked up by someone with an RFID chip in their body.
Harbisson and collaborator Moon founded the Cyborg Foundation to promote the development of new technological super-senses, along with the Trans-Species Society which aims to promote non-human identities and the freedom of self-design.
Born said: ‘Moon is a dancer, and she decided to have chips implanted in her hand and foot, the most important being the foot that allowed her to sense earthquakes.
‘The way it happens is that the chip is connected to the internet via Bluetooth and then there is a website on the internet that tracks the seismic activity of earthquakes around the world.
‘This information would be transmitted to the Moon in the form of vibrations. So she is literally connected to the planet.’
This artificial hand lets people ‘feel’ the temperature (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne)
Other recent research hopes to give people the ability to “feel” through artificial limbs, including sensing the warmth of another human.
A team led by Prof. Solaiman Shokur of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne has created sensors on an artificial hand that can transmit sensations to a person’s limb, creating a “phantom” sensation of heat or cold.
Born says she believes it’s inevitable that “transhumanist” technology will be used in some way.
“Are we really heading towards this science fiction future?” she asks. “Or is it possible to use this stuff to actually benefit people.” We must try to anticipate this, otherwise it will be the few billionaires, the military and the politicians who make all the decisions for the rest of the species.
CYBORG: A DOCUMENTARY will hit theaters in Fall 2024. For more information, visit www.instagram.com/cyborgadocumentary