On the Development of Cyborg Technology

Front cover of The Lawrentian 
Autumn Edition 2020 [1]

I don't know why some people dream of becoming-machine, whilst others fantasise about becoming-animal. I suppose in both cases it's all about enhancement - i.e., not only improving or strengthening what we are, but in some sense transcending our present (all-too-human) condition.

At any rate, researchers have recently made significant progress with the goal of integrating electronics with human tissue (including grey matter), thanks to the use of a conjugated polymer coating for components.

Previously, this was proving extremely difficult to accomplish, for traditional microelectronic materials - such as silicon, gold, or stainless steel - cause damage to organic material and the scarring that results disrupts or prevents the sending of electrical signals.

But now, thanks to poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) - or PEDOT as it is conveniently known - it looks like we'll soon be able to establish a seamless interface between hardware and soft tissue and merge artificial intelligence with the brain [2].

Is that a good thing? Well, it's certainly being sold to us as such; not because scientists will be able to create a race of superhuman cyborgs, but because it will enable a new generation of medical implants, dramatically improving the survival rate and quality of life of patients who may urgently require such.

And, I suppose, push comes to shove, if diagnosed with an intracranial tumour, I'd welcome these developments.

However, as a reader of D. H. Lawrence, I can't help being a little troubled by the thought of man's reinvention by the machine and wonder if one shouldn't try to side-step further enframing by technology ...? [3]    

Notes

[1] The material in this post was originally intended for publication in The Lawrentian (Autumn 2020), ed. David Brock, but was cut due to limitations of space. The new issue, on D. H. Lawrence and the question concerning technology, is out on 11 September. 

[2] For more details, see the recent press release from the American Chemical Society headed "'Cyborg' technology could enable new diagnostics, merger of humans and AI." (17 August, 2020): click here. 

[3] I'm thinking in particular here of Lawrence's poems in The 'Nettles' Notebook, such as 'Man and Machine' and 'Side-step, O sons of men!' - see The Poems Vol. 1, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013), pp. 552 and 554. 

Rise of the Xenobots

Image credit: Menno Van Dijk / Getty Images

One of the things that D. H. Lawrence disliked about machines was what he termed their iron insentience.

But such a charge becomes increasingly irrelevant in an age of artificially intelligent cyborgs, silicone sex dolls, and newly created xenobots - i.e., living machines, built by researchers in the United States, using stem cells obtained from African clawed frogs (Xenopus laevis).

Beings that, whilst not spawned in the usual manner, are nevertheless organisms composed of biological tissue and not the inanimate and imbecile devices that Lawrence knew, assembled in factories from metal and plastic and held together with nuts and bolts.

Not only are they capable of independent movement, but, when damaged, xenobots can heal their own wounds. Once they have completed their task and the energy in their cells runs out, they die and decay just like other biodegradable objects (including ourselves). Their unique properties suggest xenobots may, in the future, have numerous applications in medicine and in helping safeguard the environment.

The xenobots, which are currently less than a millimetre long, are designed by an evolutionary algorithm on a supercomputer. The program generates random three dimensional forms and then tests each design in a virtual environment. The best are then used to create further designs, so that in this way the xenobots might be said to evolve.

The scientists involved patiently waited for the 100th generation before then selecting a handful of designs to produce in the lab, using tweezers and other tiny tools to sculpt early-stage skin and cardiac cells harvested from frog embryos. The resulting xenobots were placed in dishes of water to keep them alive and where they could be observed gaily swimming about.

The plan is to eventually not only make them bigger, but more complex; to build xenobots with blood vessels and sensory cells, for example, using mammalian tissue so that they can survive on dry land. Of course, once you create new organisms who can experience pain and possess rudimentary cogntive ability (i.e., have nervous systems and tiny brains), then there are obviously ethical issues to be addressed.

Indeed, there are doubtless people reading this now who will be worrying - perhaps not unreasonably - about rapid and profound advances in bio-technology. But that's a discussion for another day. For now, it's just fascinating to consider the implications of man inventing machines that now generate new life forms, throwing the binary oppositions that are usually invoked by vitalists like Lawrence into confusion and disarray. 

See: Sam Kriegman, Douglas Blackiston, Michael Levin, and Josh Bongard, 'A scalable pipeline for designing reconfigurable organisms', Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, (Jan 2020): click here.

Thanks to Thomas Bonneville for bringing this research to my attention.