101
Cyborg: A Documentary – new film about first upgraded human asks whether we should just because we can.
(theconversation.com)
this post was submitted on 20 Sep 2024
101 points (93.9% liked)
Technology
59169 readers
2254 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I think generally, assistive devices like Hawking's wheelchair/speech synth wouldn't qualify one for the title of "cyborg", since they're replacing lost/damaged functionality, and didn't grant him any abilities not already available to the average person. Whereas Harbisson's modification is giving him additional abilities that he didn't previously have and are outside of the typical human experience.
Replacing lost functionality is also acceptable for a cyborg, but Hawkings simply didn't replace any organic part of himself, he used external devices. Someone with cochlear implants or a total artificial heart totally should count as a cyborg though - they have integrated mechanical body parts (well, both are partly external I guess...)
But it doesn't really make sense that just because this version of a hearing implant doesn't give you better than normal hearing, having an identical device that did would be the difference between being a cyborg or not.