I am not a starfish.

You breathe, you cry. You grow and smile. You build, you love. And then what? We are organisms and are destined to retire.

Body, flesh, microchips, networks — do these things go together?

What is the line, the boundary between life and machine… does it matter? How does it define us? Will it destroy us?

Is this the moment of Singularity? I am determined to implant a small machine into my prosthetic eye. Who will I be when it happens? What percentage human vs. machine will I be? What will it trigger – this act? What rights will I achieve? What rights will I relinquish? Is this the diversity that we strive for or is this the beginning of our Matrix demise?

After reaching the limitations of my biology – after all I am not a starfish, I cannot re-grow my eye. I have determined to recreate what was lost with technology that is now available. I have been called a Transhumanist, the Bionic Woman, Seven of Nine, an attention whore. I believe in transcendence and I believe in transformation, but to what extreme? I do not identify Transhumanist just like I have trouble identifying White. Because I am also Guatemalan, also Greek, also Irish, also German.

Transhumanism – I’m not really interested in living forever, too much pressure. I am anxious for the next chapter. And I am pretty sure there is something more. Not what is written in any scripture, but something that the flesh and spirit knows what came before.. we continue to be recycled into the dust of the universe.

This is my journey, this is my exploration of what it means to be human and to be alive. And while this is my personal manifesto, it is also a soft warning, a suggestive nod that this reconfiguration of body, of self; the blending of biology and technology will ultimately change us all. My closest friends and family are luddites and really don’t have a clue on why I’m doing this, but this is why I love them, it also reminds me to keep what’s important in perspective. To be clear I’m not advocating ignorance – I encourage debating the issues of self, rights, ethics, privacy, etc. when it comes to how this brave new world will change us; so we as Humans are not lost in the machine and find ourselves with no voice in the technological revolution.

#cyborg #Transhumanism #TanyaVlach #matrix #privacy #humanrights #ethics #evolution #manifesto