Issues of the body: Cyborg and Alife

In this week’s lecture we studied, Issues of the body: Cyborg and Alife. The topic of Cyborg’s was introduced and how television programmes such as Doctor Who have introduced the idea of having a half human, half robot. This got me thinking about the future for humans and the development of artificial life and whether the fictional characters in TV programmes could become a reality.
This led me to want to explore the question; do you think there are any sci-fi films that can come true?

In some sci-fi TV programmes they focus on DNA or genetic reasons as to why people have superhuman abilities. For example in the television programme Heroes the characters have mutated genes. This has had enabled them to have superhuman abilities such as flying or teleportation. I think that this is an extreme case of mutated genes and therefore I don’t believe that this will ever happen amongst humans in the future.
However Doctor Who contains The Cybermen. The Cybermen were originally a wholly organic species which began to implant more and more artificial parts into their bodies as a means of self-preservation. This led to the race becoming coldly logical and calculating, with emotions usually only shown when naked aggression was called for.



The idea of the future containing Cybermen may seem extreme, but I feel that with the development of artificial life these fictional characters may influence future developments of artificial life. For example in the future we may be able to develop mechanical limbs for people who have lost their own.



In answer to the question, do you think there are any sci-fi films that can come true? I believe that one day there may be a development of artificial life such as hearts and limbs. In the future there maybe humans who have lost limbs who now have a mechanical arm similar to the Cybermen. However I do not believe that humans will ever be born with or develop superhuman abilities

Reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberman