Are we soon to become augmented people and rival with artificial intelligence? Will we remain forever young and never again be sick? If cyborgs and androids are still the stuff of science-fiction, research in biotechnology, neuroscience and artificial intelligence is progressing rapidly and companies are starting to merchandise solutions to augment our capabilities and our physical or intellectual performances.

The idea of improving human performance wasn’t born yesterday and the term transhumanism would have been invented by the biologist Julian Huxley (the brother of Aldous Huxley¹) starting in 1957. Revived in the United States during the 80s in California, the transhumanism movement puts forth overcoming the physical and mental boundaries of human nature thanks to technology. Today many scientists are working on the development of cutting-edge technologies so that, one day, humans may fusion with the machine and become more perfected human beings.

According to Dave Evans, a renowned expert in new technologies and the internet of things² , fusion between technology and biology will be evolutionary. He estimates this process will unfold in three phases: the 'portable', 'integrative' and the 'replaceable' phases.

The portable phase, that in which we are now in with, for example, the health apps on watches or our smartphones collecting data and allow to follow indicators such as our cardiac rhythm, our blood pressure, our weight, etc. This 'portable' phase has recently found a new dimension with the implantation of sub-cutaneous chips by the Swedish biohacker collective Bionyfiken. These implants use the Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, also used on contactless credit cards or mobile payment systems. They allow to store data and to communicate without contact with connected devices such as telephones, debit card, transportation kiosks, office doors or fitness space… the possibilities seem almost infinite. This still experimental practice arises many questions, in particular in terms of data safety.  With so much personal information contained in one single little object, what are the risks? Could someone hack the chip and add or hijack data? Will one always have the choice to go off the grid?

The integrative phase, towards which we are heading with innovations such as neuronal implants. Right now, research conducted within the Neuralink company, founded by Elon Musk seek to implant a chip in the human brain to allow people suffering from physical handicaps to recover the movement capability thanks to a device that will transmit data with a wireless connection and be able to control a machine by thought alone: a robotic arm or a computer mouse, for instance. Neuralink has been doing tests on monkeys in the past several years with surprising results. A video shows how, for example, Pager, a monkey, can play the game of Pong simply with his mind! The first human tests have been postponed this year, pending FDA approval. A deadline the CEO of Neuralink is waiting for with impatience explaining that in the long term, his ambition is for humans to 'become only one' with artificial intelligence, whose power and omnipresence are developing  exponentially these past few years. According to him, if Mankind wants to have a chance to rival AI, it will need to boost its brain.

In the replaceable phase, technology will become so performing that it will be possible to replace parts of our body with artificial technologies. Artificial protheses, for instance, will replace not only deficient members, but also enable boosting the natural performances of the regular human. Many advances give a glimpse of this near future. Built out of aluminum reinforced with carbon plates, the Bebionic3, hand, for example, already lets its users recover the ability to write or tie their shoes while supporting a weight of 45 kg [approx. 100 lbs]. Financed by the US Army, the motorized Luke Arm (by way of reference to Luke Skywalker) gives possibility to veterans missing an arm to find an unequalled freedom of movement. In Sweden, research has resulted in the perfecting of a prothesis that via electrodes directly implanted in the muscles and nerves can be steered by thought alone and to experience 'tactile' sensations. Hope is likewise rising for people who’ve become blind due to macular degeneration. One can thus note the discoveries of the Israeli company Nano Retina, that has designed a revolutionary artificial retinal device imitating the natural physiological processes of the human eye and restoring functional vision. 

Uploading one’s brain with a click?

Recruited by Google in 2012 to work on artificial intelligence and machine learning projects, Ray Kurzweil, an MIT researcher and best-selling author³  goes even further in the concept of the transformation of the human species in the era of intelligent machines. With 'mind uploading', according to him, it will become technically possible to envision the modeling of our brain and in the long-term, uploading the spirit of our being on an inalterable material to be implanted freely in a body or a robot… Asked about this in a piece in the Echos, a French publication, by the philosopher and journalist Roger Pol Droit, Ray declares: "I consider that human existence does not depend on a biological body. Biology itself is nothing more than an ensemble of nanomachines. All these minuscules mechanisms in the brain, in our cells, we can model them on computers and understand they are complex machines interlinked one into the other. When I talk about fusion between us and the machines, people have sometimes negative reactions, because they are thinking about the machines we presently know. Machines that seem cold, not as subtle, complex and tender as a human being. As a function, however, of the exponential growth of technologies, the 'machines' – we ought to need to find a new word - will become as subtle and flexible as the human beings. That is, the biology of the future! It will go beyond all limitations. The machines will surpass our capabilities, and by fusing with them, we are not going to become less! Non-biological intelligence will double its power every year, or even faster still, while biological intelligence is relatively fixed. In the end, the non-biological part will predominate."

Ready for the nanorobots invasion?

Presently, the obstacles to conquer to achieve this type of functionality are still too many to count and very difficult to solve. It would be useful, in fact, to have a reliable cognitive computational model, that is, a logic system capable of reproducing the workings of a human brain. As such, if the uploading of neuronal structures of an individual into a digital system appears today to be science-fiction, other bodily transformations are taking place and there is already talk of the enormous potential of nanorobots. Microscopic robots that could invade our bodies to augment our capabilities and stretch our life expectancies. These could as well repair a damaged vein or clean cholesterol-clogged arteries, substitute themselves to antibodies to be attached to a virus and prevent infections, rid the body of parasites or even replace DNA deficient bits… But if even in an article published in Nature in August 2020, specialized nanorobotics researchers already describe a way to manufacture these minuscule mobile robots, invisible to the naked eye, designed to venture into environments with extreme acidity and temperatures: "these are rudimentary robots and bring to mind Frogger, the famous 80s arcade game,  the Cnet website describes. For the time being, they are not yet capable to operate in an autonomous manner." 

Old age is over

The rapid advance of these technologies and those of biology give may hopes to partisans of transhumanism. In September 2019, the “MIT Technology Review” titled in a oh-so-slightly provocative way: "Old age is over!". In this article, the journal asks several of best known scientists on the subject, of which David Sinclair, biologist at Harvard University who in 2017 achieved to reverse aging of the DNA of a mouse. For him, aging should be easier to cure than cancer. "Today, most severe illnesses are linked to aging. Therefore, identifying the cellular mechanisms and treatments for aging should be urgent", he declares. 

An opinion shared by Guillaume Velve Casquillas, a former researcher in physics (CNRS, ENS Paris) and cellular biology (Institut Curie) and co-founder of the Elvesys Microfluidic Innovation Center. Within the ‟Long Long Life″ community, he defends the idea "that in the 21st century, death is perhaps not inevitable, and that we can be the actors of our life span". For him, three tools issued from biotechnology may enable us, in the coming decades, to slow, even stop aging:

- Genetic Big Data (to identify the genes responsible for aging)

- Gene therapies (to consequently modify the genome)

- Humans on a chip (to test the millions of necessary gene therapies combinations to find the most optimal ones).

Because "even though gene therapies exist since the 80s, explains Guillaume Velve Casquillas in a TEDx conference, at the beginning one could not control where the gene was placed. In 2012, the discovery of CRISPR-Cas9⁴ fixes this problem. By itself, this discovery will not stop the process of human aging. But research and clinical tests are multiplying very quickly." In addition, the development of human cell cultures on small microfluidic chips or 'humans' on a chip makes it possible to limit tests on humans and animals as much as possible. "This technology makes it possible to take cells from under a patient's skin and transform them into the basic cells of any of their organs: liver, lungs, brain... once intelligently organized, these cell cultures form multi-organs on chips, 'humans' on a chip", explains Guillaume Velve Casquillas who sees this as a major technology for modifying tens, even hundreds of genes in the same patient to stop their aging process.

Anti-Aging Therapies

On the website of the Heales (Healthy Life Extension Society) organization many other hopeful findings are recited, such as a vaccine to eliminate those cells responsible for aging (only tested on mice as of now) or a vaccine destined to prevent and slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Some scientists have so much confidence in their discoveries they are ready to take the risk to test these on themselves. This is what Liz Parrish, the CEO of BioViva did, who followed two experimental gene therapies imagined by her own company: the first to counter the loss of muscle mass linked to age and the second to fight against depletion of stem cells responsible for disease and disability. If this research has not yet been validated, those undertaken to recreate human organs from stem cells already makes it possible to 'manufacture' retinal cells, muscles, cartilage, or even a perfectly functional whole liver. American researchers have succeeded in partially regenerating the spinal cord of patients who have suffered a stroke (or CVA – cerebral vascular accident) and clinical trials are underway to replace lost neurons. It would even be possible to 'reprogram' adult cells into stem cells, which would allow 'self-repair' of organs. 

As one can see, whether it’s research conducted in the fields of biotechnologies, nanotechnologies, artificial intelligence or the cognitive sciences, by placing all their hopes in technology to liberate humanity from the ills it suffers, the partisans of transhumanism radically question the concept that we have had until now of the human body (in that it is subject to the test of time or disease). And, in a broader way, of what it means to be a human being.

1- Aldous Huxley is the author of the science-fiction novel: "Brave New World".

2- He is the author of "The Internet of Intelligent Things: Your Guide to The Connected Future".

3- Starting in 1990, he publishes "The Age of Intelligent Machines", then in 1998 "The Age of Spiritual Machines: when computers exceed Human Intelligence", in 2005, "The Singularity is near: when humans transcend biology", in 2012 "How to Create a Mind, The Secret of Human Thought Revealed" and in 2022, "The Singularity is nearer".

4- Awarded a Nobel Prize in 2020, the CRISPR/Cas9 system is a genome editing tool for cutting DNA at a specific point in the genome, in any cell.

Sources: MIT Technology Review, iatranshumanisme.com, L’ADN, consoglobe.com, Courrier International, futura-science.com, Journal du net, Les Echos