The singularity is almost upon us, and we live in trepidation of the possibility of annihilation. The ultimate irony would be to be wiped out by our own creation.

Prometheus brought down the fire from upon high and gave it to the people. Lest we took that blaze and became gods; creating a new species that ultimately consumed us.

It's a stark, and compelling vision that lingers at the edge of society. However now it is moving from the fringes, into the mainstream. Serious debates about the possible dangers of artificially intelligent machinery, take place now almost on a daily basis.

Call Me Borg For I Am Many

In the Star Trek film; 'First Contact', fans were introduced to a species of nefarious cybernetic organisms called the Borg.

They were a race of humanoid cyborgs who were intent on assimilating the galaxy. Although it is never entirely clear, the Borg appear to have super-evolved from an organic humanoid species.

At some point in their past, they married technology and evolution, and create a race that are genetically superior to most other lifeforms they meet.

For entertainment purposes the Borg are necessarily evil. Taking on Naziesque proportions in their ongoing goal for genetic perfection.

When you look at the human race today, it is not so far-fetched to believe that we too one day might become like the Borg, minus all the assimilation and resistance is futile stuff.

If we look around today, especially in the field of medical technology, we can see plenty of live examples of machinery being co-opted into the human genome.

The particular branch of restorative surgery that has seen incredible leaps and bounds, is in the area of prosthetics.

For a long time a prosthetic limb meant a wooden, and then later, plastic replacement. The limbs began to look more and more like their original copies, however they could not move.

Now we see robot limbs being manipulated through the brainpower of their owners, and things will only get better.

Then we see the small but growing area of enhancements. Ever since the colourblind artist Neil Harbbison got an implant to cure himself. Then ended up with a greater range of colour vision than a 'normal' human. The idea of enhancing our senses beyond their original operating parameters is gathering strength.

In the 80s and 90s, as our knowledge in genetics grew in tandem with computing power. The buzz phrase then was one of 'designer babies'. Parents able to add or delete certain genes, from eye-colour to delinquency, genetic engineering promised it all.

Two to three decades later, we are now moving towards cyborgisation, a word that will lose its red squiggly line as it is spoken louder and louder in the next few decades to come.

Becoming The Machine

Depending on who you speak to, will determine the reaction you get if you ask the question;

"Would you get bio implants put in your body?"

It's fair to say that most people are still freaked out by the thought of having an invasive medical procedure they don't need.

However if you think about it, implants are not the start of our cyborgisation, they are merely the next step in a journey that has been happening for at least a century and possibly more.

The first electronically amplified hearing aids were developed in 1913. This was the first time that the human race had employed an unthinking electronic machine, to help out inefficient or defective organs.

Whilst it is easy to accept that having a hearing aid, or any other implant that helps you to see or hear could be classed as cyborgisation.

It is harder to see that our smartphones make us part-cyborg to an even greater degree.

At the centre of cyborg philosophy we can see that it is all about replacing or enhancing functions within our existing organs.

Well the brain is an organ, and it has many day to day functions which we have been handing over to our smartphones for some time now.

When I was growing up in a world without mobile phones, I could remember about forty phone numbers. Some of them I still recall today!

Now however I can only be bothered to remember about five key numbers with my organic brain, the rest I happily leave my more suited electronic brain to store and order them for me.

Not convinced?

Come with me on a short thought experiment; imagine you live in a world, whereby everything is exactly the same as it is now, with one major exception.

If you lose a limb, you can grow it back with roughly the same amount of hassle as getting a new phone with all the apps, numbers, etc.

So now think back to the last time you lost or broke your phone beyond repair (if you've never done this, bully for you you smug so-and-so!).

When you lost/broke your phone, remember the despair you felt, the sense of loss. Even though you knew you could replace it in a couple of days, maybe a week, still, you felt devastation.

Now imagine you lose your arm; of course in today's world, you couldn't compare the loss of a gadget to the loss of a limb.

But in a world where you could grow one back fairly quickly, the loss you felt would be similar to the one you felt when losing your phone.

This is because they are both parts of you, it's just that your smartphone isn't constantly attached to you.

So will it really be that different if your smartphone is in fact just a chip inside you? Instead of using your hands to pick it up and activate, you use a thought command.

Instead of seeing the information on a screen, you see it in your mind's eye, or simply floating in your field of vision.

If you took someone from 1940 and did that to them, their hearts may well explode from shock. Do it to anybody who has lived in any kind of city setting outside of North Korea, and they will be impressed, but their hearts would remain intact.

So we are all cyborgs-in-waiting, in the same way our brains can adapt to understand signals from a hearing aid, a prosthetic limb, or a smartphone. So too are they ready to accept cybernetic implants.

The question is where will that take us?

To bigger and better things we hope, for me it is simple; I look around all the enhancements we have today and I say:

I've seen the future, and it works!

DO YOU SHARE MY OPTIMISM? DO YOU WELCOME THE DAY WHEN WE BECOME A CYBORG RACE; OR DO YOU DREAD THE VERY THOUGHT? AS EVER, LET ME KNOW BELOW!

[Borg picture credit](By picture from DS9: "Emissary", Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13035666)

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