Cyborgs are often included in a futuristic view, but what are cyborgs exactly? The term cyborg was first used in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline, they defined it as a being with organic and biomechatronic body parts. One could thus argue that the future is already there since bionic limbs already have been used, but what does this imply for the future and our current notions of the human body? As we all learned, evolution made us become the humans we are today. But with the new knowledge we have nowadays and the rise of technology, we do not want to wait around anymore to let evolution do its thing. We took things in our own hands and are now reengineering our own bodies and biochemistry. Experts argue that there are three possible paths along which we further the develop our own being: biological engineering, cyborg engineering and the engineering of non-organic beings.

When we develop biological engineering, we reject natural selection and we start changing the structures of our brain, our DNA and our hormonal systems. Our genetics and biochemistry can change completely, and we might even be able to grow new limbs for people who lost their own. Cyborg engineering is something that is already happening to some extent, through electrodes both humans and monkeys have already controlled bionic limbs with their mind. This fusion of our organic bodies and non-organic devices can lead to all kinds of new abilities. Surgeons can for instance operate on a distance, just by using the electrodes that are connected to their brains. The  last path, engineering of non-organic beings, takes the notion of unconnected body parts a step further, it removes them completely for the future and suggest we will operate only digitally, with our consciousness uploaded somewhere online.

The discussion on the scenarios sketched above has everything to do with extropianism, which is defined as the discussion on: “evolving framework of values and standards for continuously improving the human condition”. If you frame it like this, probably no one would argue against progress like this, we could cure all diseases and change our biochemistry in a way that we will always be happy. However, with all these developments, and concepts as indefinite lifespans lurking, a more ethical question arises; to what extent do we really want to alter the human body, are we evolving into a new human species and should we hit the brakes? Or is it another consequence of human development and should we go along with it?
References:
Cyborgs and Space, in Astronautics (September 1960), by Manfred E. Clynes and American scientist and researcher Nathan S. Kline.

Harari, Y. (2016). Homo Deus. London, United Kingdom: Vintage.

Max More (2003). “Principles of Extropy (Version 3.11): An evolving framework of values and standards for continuously improving the human condition”. Extropy Institute.

After the tragedy of 9/11, everybody was astonished that airplanes were used as a weapon for the terroristic attack, for that had never happened before. In 1994 however, the writer Tom Clancy published a book in which an airplane was used to attack the US government. This led to an enormous brainstorm session in Washington, attended by filmmakers and writers, to come up with possible scenarios for another attack.

This inspired former film maker Peter de Kock, who got his PhD in 2014 on the dissertation “Anticipating criminal behaviour”. This dissertation provides the building blocks of a computer model that predicts (the narratives of) terrorist attacks. The model is based on an enormous database of terrorist attacks that happened, but also on terrorist attacks that were created on a creative basis, in for instance a book or a movie. According to the model, every attack has a narrative, and the narrative consists of building blocks, the so-called anatomy of the attack. The narrative entails a wide range of scenario components, examples include: a protagonist, an antagonist, an arena, a modus operandi, symbolism and a red herring (a false clue). In total there are twelve components, and with these components, every story can be told. All the attacks in the database, whether they were real or fiction, are dissected into these twelve components. Each component has its own sub-components (e.g. bomb or rope), in total adding up to more than 200.00 sub-components. The compilation of all this data is mostly done by text mining.

To let the model run, as much components (by extracting them from a situation) as can be found are being put into the algorithms of the models. Then, the model compares this with the hundreds of thousands of narratives and sub-components that are in the database, looking for a correlation between some of the narratives. Resulting in scenarios where a plate of copper found in the east of the Netherlands can be traced back to a Jihad-warrior who used a similar plate for an attack in Syria and who was from Dutch descent and recently returned to the Netherlands. Since a couple of years AI is used to create new scenarios based on the data in the model. The model can thus be compared to a chess computer, thinking a few steps ahead and analysing every potential move a terrorist can make. In this way governments and companies can protect themselves better against potential threats, after all humans are only unpredictable to a certain extent.

Sources:
https://www.pandoraintelligence.com/index/

Click to access De_Kock_Anticipating_10_09_2014_emb_tot_10_12_2014.pdf