:: ENTER A POST-HUMAN FUTURE IN WHICH HUMANS MERGE COMPLETELY WITH MACHINES ::

‘We exist, we humans, in the wreckage of an imagined splendour. It was not supposed to be this way: we weren’t supposed to be weak, to be ashamed, to suffer, to die.’ [O’Connell 2017: 1]

‘Transhumanism is a liberation movement advocating nothing less than a total emancipation from biology itself.’ [O’Connell 2017: 6]

‘where does this bring us as far as the human body, spirit or soul goes? And I guess you could argue it can be transplanted.’

THE POST-HUMAN




The practises of performance artist Stelarc involve the conjoining of his body with technology; his work heavily focuses of the extension of the human bodies capabilities. Willing to open up his body to the intrusion of technology, he alludes to the body as having an ‘original prosthecity’: this relates to the concept of the ‘body in process’ and philosophical traditions that ‘see the self as always relational, and always defined by its interconnections with others’.

‘The Ear on Arm’ is a project often subject to controversy and ethical dilemmas. Stelarc however, is of the belief that engineering additional and external organs allow us to function better in the technological and media terrain we now inhabit.

‘The posthuman refers to the destabilisation and unsettling of boundaries between human and machine, nature and culture, and mind and body that digital and biotechnologies are seen to be engendering.’ [Blackman 2008: 117]

‘This additional and enabled EAR ON ARM effectively becomes an Internet organ for the body…the biological body is not well organised. The body needs to be Internet enabled in more intimate ways. THE EAR ON ARM project suggests an alternate anatomical architecture - the engineering of a new organ for the body: an available, accessible and mobile organ for other bodies in other places, enabling people to locate and listen in to another body elsewhere.’ [Stelarc: 2008]

Will our bodies develop parallel to technological advancements of the future? Where does this leave the body as we know it in years to come? Will love and relationships be contextualised differently due to technologies development?