Jomo Fray '10, English 65, The Cyborg Self, Brown University (Fall 2006)

Some of the first tools consisted of sticks and stones. Monkeys have been seen using sticks and stones to crack open nuts and hollow branches. Why not take the next step and have the stick built-it? Tools have always been man's means of survival . Thus the question quickly arises; Why not fuse man and machine? Man has reached the boundaries of the evolutionary process. Man's impatience has made it a necessity to create that which nature did not. Humans could not pierce the skin of a variety of animals, thus the knife was created. Man's infatuation with technological integration represents his undying struggle for dominance over his surroundings. Yet, the direction in which man is headed seems to indicate the transcendence of the surroundings themselves; the complete dematerialization of the human body. Is the next step in the evolutionary process to become William Gibbon's character Dixie or Rocky Morton's Max Headroom?


Course Website cyborg Body & Self Literature

Last modified 31 October 2006