Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Cyborg: When humans become media


As tools are developed, theories invented, techno sciences elaborated, devices created, do we risk becoming slaves of our progress? Indeed, with all these technologies emerging around us today, everything that appeared fictional seems to become reality and our relation to the media is being radically transformed. Obviously, through external devices, such as iPads or smart phones, it is now possible to be in constant contact with a medium that allows us to receive information, through the web or otherwise, at any time. However, other new or future technologies are very surprising, like internal devices such intra-human chips, since it seems that we may soon become the medium ourselves.

The human space is constantly changing. Of course, we learn to live with these changes and the human adapts to the new operation of smart phones, for example, or other technological advancements never seen before. We tend therefore to this so-called "Intelligent Society", where the spread of knowledge and expertise constantly transform our way of life. However, these changes within the societies, for years, tend to make the human being almost at the service of technologies, and dependent on them.

I will consider three more or less realistic examples of technological innovations that tend to further transform our relationship to the media, the information and thus, the world we live in.

First, in the continuity of smartphones, but with a much higher level of intrusiveness between human and the real world, there would soon be, if we believe Google, glasses allowing us to see the world through a device referring what is seen to Internet. This topic has already been developed on the blog, but I still give the YouTube link that shows how these glasses, almost merging the individual with the medium, seems to isolate the human from the outside world close to him.



A second experiment, first developed in 1998, is to transform the human body into a machine, so merging it with the medium, to enable it to transmit information directly to another human. This is the experience of Kevin Warwick, the first "human cyborg", which consists of inserting a chip into the arms of two people to enable them to communicate with their nervous systems.


Finally, the feats of a certain Sterlac illustrate the third attempt, even more innovative, and therefore less realistic today, to transform man into medium; human cyborg of modern times. He said we are in the heart of a post human generation and we will soon be able to see, hear and connect on the web through the eyes, arms and ears of anyone, and this, through worldwide with phones and integrated chips directly to humans ... He therefore supports that eventually soon, all technologies will be invisible, as they will be inside the human body to make it more efficient. Fact or Fiction? For me, his most recent experience proves one thing: he is not totally wrong. With the collaboration of experts in plastic surgery and the most advanced technology, he had a transplantation of an ear, equipped with a microphone chip, in his left arm. The experiment is a failure, due to an infection that requires him to remove the implant, but it would allow anyone connected to the internet to hear everything that goes around the arm of the artist.

Imagine a few seconds what our life might look like if we had internet access in our arms and a cell chip in our ears constantly, 24 hours a day ... We talk about excess. Everything is good with some moderation right? What would we become if we were necessarily connected with all our technology consistently? We would be like cyborgs. Yes, real cyborgs, humans with real dentures inside their bodies, without the possibility to disconnect whenever they want. Real new organs for the human body, but that would be artificial and would become part of the skin, muscles and even brain...

The concept of the cyborg is then pushed to the limit. We could already define us as a kind of cyborg, because we use all kinds of tools, prosthetics, and sensory extensions known for decades. However, we did not necessarily truly predict this eventual possibility of a technology completely in symbiosis with humans, one not going without the other. Obviously, this is not for tomorrow, but these experiments remain an unequivocal example of the evolution of technology currently incredibly hurried.

But is it really for the better when the current communication we thought only possible by computers threatens to be implemented within an "additional technological bodies" allowing communication entirely "Visceral and sensorial"?

Another major disruptive to society if we were to develop these famous dentures would further accentuate the detachment of humans to the real world. Obviously, the technological advancements are a great wealth in our culture today and the benefits are numerous. However, there are also negative aspects. We already live in a society where reality is somewhat distorted and where all types of interactions are clearly modified. But then, human relationships would be truly affected. Staying connected 24 hours, every day, would probably result in, creating an even larger wall between the cocoon in which we shut ourselves and the world outside us. There might be less immediate interpersonal contacts, because we would be completely separated from the surrounding world and we would be concerned to walk from a cyber-universe to another.

If we continue to transform ourselves in sort of medium for all kind of information, we would be less available for human interactions. Moreover, we would be in constant ubiquity, never in one place at the same time, which is already the case with today's technologies. Maybe these technologies are transcending the acceptable limits?


No comments:

Post a Comment