‘You’d never even know I’m a cyborg’
WHY PEOPLE ARE USING EXPERIMENTAL TECHNOLOGY TO UPGRADE THEIR BODIES
When most of us imagine what it’s like to be a cyborg, we conjure up images of Arnold Schwarzenegger firing laser pistols as the Terminator, or a metal-clad Robocop fighting crime on the streets of Detroit. But real-life cyborgs bear little resemblance to Hollywood’s cybernetic heroes and villains. Tamara Banbury would know — she is one.
Banbury, a PHD candidate at Carleton University who studies voluntary cyborgs, doesn’t have red robotic eyes or limbs crafted from steel. In fact, “you’d never even know I’m a cyborg just by looking at me,” she says. She has two small microchips — each no bigger than a SIM card — implanted in her hands. The right one is a near-field communication chip, which she could, in theory, use to unlock her phone or share contact information. But these days she mainly uses it to redirect people’s devices to Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” music video (a.k.a. Rickrolling), which she thinks is hilarious. (Most people agree.) In her left hand, there’s a radio-frequency identification chip. It’s not set up to do anything at the moment, but other cyborgs use the same device to open doors and turn on lights with such ease the acts could pass as telekinesis.
To the unenlightened, Banbury’s setup might sound like something straight out of a Black Mirror episode. But cyborg biohacking — the use of experimental technology to augment and ultimately enhance a user’s life — is becoming more and more common. These implantable devices are capable of far more than internet trolling and unlocking doors: some fictional cyborgs have functioning video cameras implanted in their eye sockets, earthquake sensors and vibrating penile implants. Neil Harbisson, possibly the most famous non-fictional cyborg, invented a device that detects colour frequencies and translates them into sound. He hears a symphony of colours every single day.
“Knowledge comes from our senses, so if we extend our senses, we will consequently extend our knowledge,” he said in a TED Talk. “I think life will be much more exciting when we stop creating applications for mobile phones and we start creating applications for our own body.”
The way Banbury sees it, the world has drastically changed since 2007, after the first iphone was released. Since, we’ve not only accepted, but embraced all sorts of technology that we couldn’t have foreseen twelve years ago: The Apple Watch, Google Glass, VR headsets. She predicts that the next step will be a natural transition from external to internal devices.
“There’s already been a social change in the way we identify with technology,” Banbury says. “If you misplace your phone, you get a feeling in the pit of your stomach and start padding your pockets because you feel like it should be on you. It’s basically a part of you. I store most of my life on it, but that’s an incredibly insecure platform. I think that someday, instead of having a sim card in your device, people will have it in the palms of their hands.”
A handful of companies have gotten a head start on bringing implants into the mainstream, including Harbisson’s own “mindware” business, which markets senses beyond the five most people are born with. Their North Sense implant monitors the earth’s geomagnetic field and acts as a built-in compass.
Other companies, like the Australia-based Livestock Labs, are biohacking for health. They manufacture what’s essentially a “Fitbit for cows” — an implantable device that measures body temperature, heart rate and can detect early signs of disease — and hope to create similar chips for humans within the next decade.
“As more of these technologies emerge, I really hope people will start to see the utility, the functionality and the coolness behind them,” says Amanda Plimpton, who has 10 implants (including microchips similar to Banbury’s and LED “fireflies” that make her glow in the dark) and works as the chief operations officer at Livestock Labs. “The goal is to help people live better lives.”
In addition to developing new tech, the small but growing army of cyborgs are working on answering a handful of legal and ethical questions regarding body autonomy, freedom of choice, and what it means to be human. In 2016, The Cyborg Foundation, alongside electronic civil rights and civil liberties researcher Rich Mackinnon, created the Cyborg Bill of Rights, which demands equality for mutants, freedom of morphology and the right to bodily sovereignty. The community has also been working on writing a code of ethics, which will be published by the Human Augmentation Institute by the end of the year.
“This community is made up of citizen scientists, and they’re trying to do good science that respects body autonomy, has fully-informed consent and is safe,” says Plimpton. “We are starting to see more and more acceptance, and we can only grow from here.”
I THINK THAT SOMEDAY, INSTEAD OF HAVING A SIM CARD IN YOUR DEVICE, PEOPLE WILL HAVE IT IN THE PALMS OF THEIR HANDS. — TAMARA BANBURY