It would be natural to begin a book dedicated to ‘cyborg persons ’ with broad references to post and transhumanism. This of course will happen in the following pages, because it is impossible to discuss issues regarding the redefinition of ‘human person ’ without the perspective developed by these branches of contemporary reflection in humanities, understood as interdisciplinary field within cultural studies. Yet I do not consider them as a necessary departing point, because the topic in question is of greater significance and should also be approached philosophically.
Technological enhancement—developments in genetic engineering, artificial intelligence and robotics, and so forth—are processes that are currently happening changing the environment, urban spaces, modes of functioning, making choices, and satisfying one’s needs. These processes are not alien to human nature , as it is stressed by, for example, Pierre Levy, because technology together with language defines Homo Sapiens individuals as humans—so that “the human world is technological to its core” (Levy 1997, pp. 3–4). However, at the same time technology ceases to be manipulated externally, outside of human body , and starts to permeate it, operating from the inside connected to the world around. In this way there appear various DIY bodyhackers technologically extending their senses, like Neil Harbisson and Moon Ribas, hybrids—like ‘the daughter’ of Educardo Kac and flower Petunia: Edunia—or androids like Sophie, produced by Hanson Robotics Company from Hong Kong, recognized as an official citizen of Saudi Arabia in 2017.
In such a situation, it should be considered: how should we refer to the new entities starting to appear among purely biologically humans, and what is the significance of redefining of our relationship with them? Trying to approach that subject we encounter philosophical, sociological, and legal understandings of what it means to be a person—defining what have never been before needed to be specified—a ‘human person ’ in relation to other persons that might not be human in biological sense. This entails reconsideration of what does it mean to be human, and what is the basis of human rights granting people rights and obligations in society due to their species affiliation, as it is inscribed in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration from 1948.
Therefore, in order to rethink the notion of a person in such a way that it may include non-humans—especially cyborg persons , on whom I will focus my considerations—I propose to turn to Joseph Margolis, a contemporary American philosopher, whose extensive work on culture, language, and human persons offers an interesting post-Darwinian, non-canonical pragmatist view that allows us to understand the changes in culture and persons in evolutionary, non-reductionist perspective. Particularly helpful in this reasoning is his idea of a human person or self as an artefactual individual emergent from the process of hybrid evolution of intertwined nature and culture, due to invention and mastery of language, and everything that this entails with developments of culture and technology (Margolis 2017a, pp. 39–62).
The stripping of a human person from his assumed, probably ‘divine’ (or ‘of divine provenance’) nature or essence, as Margolis does, is bold but bright—not reducing the human world to mere matter, nor blindly accepting neo-Darwinism, but also not accepting religious or transcendental demands. The way Margolis presents human persons —as artefactual, enlanguaged, and hybrid, having no natural environment and therefore no natural source for any set of norms and rules other than that which is collectively invented, shared, and transformed historically (what he calls sittlich)—opens up for the inclusion of cyborgs into the classification of persons. It also opens for consideration of the possibilities of different kinds of ethics, possibly cyborgean ethics too, if cyborgs are to be recognized as socially defined persons, because normativity—as Margolis explains—is not rooted in any transcendental setting but rather always contingent and relational. Contemporary discussions on cyborgs and the ethical, social, and political issues that accompany them—currently happening in various places across the world—could benefit from turning to Margolis’ philosophy in the process of redefining our ideas of a person, his/her/its/their autonomy, responsibility, and freedom, as well as for imagining their possible practical applications in science and politics.
Approaching the subject of new kind of persons emerging in contemporary world, I cannot address all kinds of new entities appearing in conjunction with rapidly developing technology, then I decide to limit myself predominantly to the idea of the ‘cyborg.’ By cyborg I understand an individual being embodied in a technologically enhanced human form, who by means of (often) online technology implemented in the body has different kinds of perception, cognition, practices, patterns, habits, and/or methods of communicating in comparison to someone embodied in an unaltered human form, and who should be recognized as a cyborg person , analogically to a human person . Cyborgs are not science fiction, neither they are completely artificial entities as Sophia; they are those on the spectrum between humans and robots, having implanted technology operating from within their body and influencing their way of life.
These are such persons as Neil Harbisson, whose antenna implanted into his brain allows him to ‘hear’ colors via bone conduction, and Moon Ribas, whose implanted sensors allow her to ‘feel’ earthquakes over 1.0 on the Richter scale and movements of the Earth’s moon. There are many other DIY bodyhackers too—Harbisson and Ribas are not the first ones to implant themselves with connectivity-enabled technology in order to change their perception and communication. Eduardo Kac implanted his leg with digital memory (in radio-frequency identification (RFID)) chip form) within the art project ‘Time Capsule’ in 1997, and Kevin Warwick also implanted himself with multiple chips for sensory perception and online communication. Because these transformations may be taken as not radical enough, there is no questioning if Harbisson, Ribas, Kac, or Warwick should be granted the status of persons, although the laws are being moved, bended with the allowance of passport photo with antenna that Harbisson has. However it may be helpful to differentiate between the relatively ‘weak’ cyborg status of Kac and Warwick, and the relatively ‘strong’ status of Harbisson and Ribas (what may have implications also on a legal level).1 Harbisson’s and Ribas’ synergy of technology and senses stays for strong cyborg status, because the technology merges with the organism in the intent to alter regular performance. This is not the case of Kac and Warwick, in whose cases either the technology does not alter profoundly forms of perception and/or communication (Kac ) or its engagement is just for them time being of experiments.
Contemplating the changing conditions of personhood nowadays, there...