Cyborgs - Should we be better than we are?
Biohacker trend may become the norm
We enhance ourselves with glasses and contacts and even canes and crutches, and we think nothing of it; but what if we enhance ourselves with technology that makes us not just up to normal performance but better than normal human performance — or with different capabilities than a human?
For centuries major technological advances have been made based on the need to gain superiority in an armed conflict. From the long bow to the nuclear bomb, we have used enhancements to hand to hand combat. But can we enhance the human body to be a better fighting machine? Efforts are underway with exoskeleton armor and body sensors in the field.
Meanwhile in civilian life, the use of body enhancements ranges from the ornamental to the functional. Beyond the tatoo, magnets and small scanning devices are implanted below the skin, to pick up paperclips or open one’s own locked car doors. The people who do this are often called biohackers, but some call them cyborgs.
In 2018, a biohacker named MeowMeow in New South Wales, Australia, implanted the chip from the mass transit passcard so that he could just wave his hand for entry into the transit system. They government agency got wind of it and canceled his pass, but he just bought another one and did a second implant. They fined him with a criminal charge for failing to produce a ticket when asked, but the judge eventually dismissed the charge finding he had not taken his actions in order to avoid paying the fine.
An industry has grown from this community, and a company named “Dangerous Things” continues to develop implantable devices for personal use.
Just this summer, it was reported that Lepht Anonym, a British biohacker was the first to implant more than 50 devices in their body. The first wifi and USB storage device combination was implanted in their arm to receive, transmit and store files. It was a success until they hit their arm on a taxi door and had complications requiring its removal.1
This community is growing worldwide, and it is likely to become more acceptable as a result. But is there any safety regulation to protect the public from this growing use of implantable devices?
The general answer is “no”. There is one implantable device approved by FDA that is a small implantable chip similar to that used in your pets to store your contact information. This human implant is to store medical information about the person, and because it is related to medical treatment, it is subject to FDA approval.
This is how these devices fall into unregulated space: FDA approves two broad categories of medical products: (1) biologicals, like drugs2; and (2) devices3, like hip replacement devices. But all have to be related to treating or diagnosing human health. These implants that store information, share files, transmit wifi and open doors, are therefore not subject to FDA regulation. As a product, they could be subject to the jurisdiction of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, a non-regulatory body, with advisory and warning powers, and negotiated recall powers. So far, there have been no issues raised in the biohacking community that would involve CPSC.
So the biohackers are in a space that is largely unregulated when it comes to buying these devices.
Implanting the devices sub-dermally is also in unregulated space. It is largely a DIY process, and I have seen this done at conferences, by participants. Surgeons are regulated by their own hospital communities, as well as the state licensing authority, and they are all reluctant to implant these devices which have no approval from any safety authority. So the biohacking community has its own surgical processes, and this, too is unregulated. The civil tort system is the only mechanism to recover damages from injuries, and so far, that has not been an issue in the biohacking community, either.
I began this discussion with the question of whether we should be better than we are as humans? Individuals express themselves through body modifications from tatoos to flashing LEDs under their skin, so why not go further with additional human capabilities with programmable devices, wifi and storage devices? Right now, any individual is free to do so, with no restrictions. Age can be a restriction but it is not regulated.
So how widespread is this practice outside of the biohacking community?
Sweden has a very active biohacking community and thousands are happy to insert a microchip under their skin for various purposes.4 This may lead to making it more acceptable as a norm in Sweden.
In the United States, one employer required its employees to have implanted microchips to buy food from the company cafeteria or store in 2018.5 Now at least nine states have prohibited this practice by employers and another three or four have similar legislation under development.6
Without FDA regulation or notice to the CPSC for federal laws in the United States that regulate the use of implanted devices it remains unregulated space; but states are starting to develop their own legislation for narrow purposes like prohibiting employers from requiring implanted devices in employees.
It is important that we have these conversations about these manifestations of transhumanism when humans do more than is humanly possible. And although it is slow and ponderous, the legal system identifies societal risks after a few tort cases show harms to individuals that could affect everyone. Then regulation of risks may follow. Right now, that legal evolution is working, and whether it is a medical malpractice case, a product liability case or a privacy case, we can expect to see more of this legal evolution unfold in our very near futures.
Feeling this was a science and law topic worthy of exploration, I wrote and produced a short documentary several years ago, where I interviewed several people from the biohacking community engaged in implanting devices like these and even manufacturing them. If you would like to take a look at the documentary you can find the trailer and film at this link.
See the award-winning short documentary here: Cyborgs-Should we be better than we are?
https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/transhuman-biohacker-implanted-magnets
21 USC 321(g)
21 USC 321(h)
https://qz.com/1313537/biohacking-in-sweden-why-thousands-are-inserting-microchips-into-themselves/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/08/23/this-firm-already-microchips-employees-could-your-ailing-relative-be-next/
https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/technology/pages/indiana-bans-employers-from-requiring-microchips-workers.aspx