It was genuinely unplanned, but in one of life's spooky coincidences, the Dana
Centre launched Enhancing Me last month, a book about the science of human
enhancement, just as the new series of Heroes was hitting our screens. If
you haven't discovered it yet, Heroes is a sci-fi TV serial (Thursdays, BBC
Two, 9pm) in which ordinary mortals have each developed a specific
superhuman power. Commanding electricity, flying, walking through solid
walls, regenerating - it's familiar X-Men territory. But is it science
fiction or can humans enhance their powers, both physical and mental?
Most headline writers are convinced that super-enhancing bionics are already
with us. Earlier this month, two blind people had devices implanted in their
eyes which received pictures from a camera mounted on a pair of glasses. It
allowed them to distinguish shapes and light and shade.
This is an extraordinary achievement but it's hardly the 20:20 vision enjoyed
by LaForge with his special visor in Star Trek, let alone being able to read
a car numberplate from three miles away like the Six Million Dollar Man. On
the other hand, people do already have access to cochlear implants, that
restore high-quality sound to the previously deaf. But is this enhancement?
“No,” says Dr Pete Moore, author of Enhancing Me. “It's human beings using
clever tools.” He distinguishes between per-sonal enhancement, which might
be as simple as someone using a walking stick, and human enhancement, which
would push humans beyond the bounds of what we can now achieve: running 100m
in five seconds,for instance.
The carbon-fibre cheetah feet of “Blade Runner” Oscar Pistorius enable him to
compete with top-class athletes, but have they enhanced his personal speeds?
Since he lost both legs in childhood, a before and after comparison is not
possible. But what seems clear, after investigations by officials who banned
him from competing in the next Olympics, is that Pistorius does use 25 per
cent less energy when running, so perhaps you could say that he definitely
is enhanced, if not in speed, then in how his body behaves when he runs.
Transhumanists are people who believe it is both desirable and possible to
extend human capabilities through technology. Todd Huffman is an American
neuroscientist and transhumanist who has had a weak magnet inserted beneath
the skin of his ring finger. He also has a permanent screw fixing in his
skull so that he can attach decorations such as chrome horns at will.
Through his finger he is able to detect weak magnetic fields such as
security detection systems in shops and sense things that others miss. For
instance, his finger buzzes if an electric socket is live and he can sense
whether software on his laptop is running efficiently. This is genuinely
more likely enhancement. Curiously, “communicating” with electrical
appliances is one of the powers possessed by a character in Heroes.
The man who calls himself Cyborg 1.0
Kevin Warwick is a professor of cybernetics at Reading University. He has
dubbed himself Cyborg 1.0, the first in what he thinks will be increasingly
advanced human technology amalgams. His first experiment involved inserting
a device into his arm that allowed him to open doors, in the same way that
cats fitted with special collars can open cat flaps. Would you call him a
cyborg if he had the same device, but merely stashed in a pocket?
However, a subsequent implant in 2002 is more interesting. It plugged directly
into the nerves in his arm. One experiment involved putting ultrasonic
sensors (of the sort used in top-end cars for parking) on either side of a
baseball hat, linking them to his implant. As the sensors approached an
object, they sent a buzzing signal to his nerves.
Within six weeks he could move around blindfolded. A simpler electrode was put
into his wife's arm in an effort to enhance communication between them. He
was also able to connect his nerves up to a computer in Columbia University,
New York, networking them back to a robotic system in his lab. He claims
that: “My body was, in effect, extended over the internet.”
But half-human, half-machine as we might expect of a cyborg? It's a million
miles away.
A more likely enhancement relates to mood. Could we have a happiness switch
built in? Tipu Aziz is the Oxford neurosurgeon best known for his work with
movement disorders, such as Parkinson's disease. He implants an electrode in
a specific part of the brain. When this area is electrically stimulated, the
patient's tremor stops instantly. Many thousands of people now have these
implants for controlling Parkinson's and they are now also being used to
control pain and, significantly, depression and other mood disorders. What
if they were available for people who were not depressed but wanted to feel
in a party mood or experience more intense levels of happiness?
Aziz believes this is possible, provided, of course, that people were prepared
to risk brain surgery to have the electrode implanted. But given the example
of Warwick and Huffman, there are certainly people out there who would be
prepared to do this.
There are less drastic routes to becoming temporarily enhanced. We know that
caffeine, for instance, boosts concentration, and drugs such as Modafinil,
devised for people with narcolepsy, enhance alertness. Medicines used for
therapy by those with Alzheimer's and attention deficit hyperactivity
disorder (ADHD) can also be used by those with normally functioning minds to
enhance their brain activity.
But while a drug like Ritalin can improve concentration in those with ADHD,
those without the condition report a “tunnel effect”. It aids attention but
at the expense of creativity and imagination, nor is the effect
long-lasting.
Another possible route to enhancement might be through gene therapy. This week
we have already seen reports of sight restored by this therapy, but the
technique could conceivably also be used to create enhanced humans. For
instance, Repoxygen is a gene therapy developed by Oxford Biomedica to treat
anaemia. It persuades the body to produce more erythropoietin, a hormone
that increases the number of red blood cells. If this were used by athletes,
they would have greater levels of endurance and stamina. Other forms might
be used to increase muscle mass. But these techniques (which are as yet
confined to lab mice) would likely only slightly improve the already gifted
sportsman, not transform the likes of you and me from Sunday cyclist to Tour
de France winner.
Ethical concerns
There are many ethical concerns about enhancement. Most are about fairness,
particularly in relation to competitive sport or exams. But there are darker
worries. If a brain implant was shown to control mood, could you force a
violent criminal to have one? If many had mood-enhancing implants, could
someone override their individual controls and thus control them all? And
there are always two sides to the many coins in the enhancement debate. For
instance, chemicals called ampakines can enhance memory, but some would
rather take drugs that prevent rather than enhance memory formation, such as
those who work in stressful situations or those who have been subjected to
trauma. What if soldiers were forced to take such drugs?
There is also an issue about diversity. Ask deaf people whether they want a
cochlear implant and some, as Heather Bradshaw, a researcher who is working
on a thesis on enhancement and disability at the University of Bristol has
done, will say no. “They would rather build on some quality or talent that
they already have,” she says.
It seems one man's enhancement is another man's burden.
Enhancing Me, by Dr Pete Moore (John Wylie, £12.99), is available from
Times BooksFirst for £11.69, p&p free: 0870 1608080 or visit timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst
SUPERHUMANS IN NUMBERS
4,963 the number of World Transhumanist Association members
10kg the weight that the i-Limb, a bionic arm developed by Scottish
scientists, can lift above head height
50% the amount of muscle growth in mice when injected with DNA
120 years the predicted average human life-span by the year 3000
Source: Times database
