by Jeremy Allen
LIFT conference, Geneva - 08 February 2008 | 15:38
Daniela Cerqi is an anthropologist; Kevin Warwick is professor of cybernetics at Reading University, and had a microchip implanted in his arm. For two years, she observed Warwick’s work to get ideas for the lectures she gives at the University of Lausanne. He calls her “the little Devil” on his shoulder. Their separate backgrounds give them different views on what Warwick’s cyborg project could mean for humankind.
It’s not unusual to get into a debate at LIFT, the technology conference that ends on Saturday in Geneva. Kevin Warwick and Daniela Cerqui started theirs seven years ago when they met at a conference much like this one. Their discussions, based around Warwick's cyborg project, continue today.

In 2002 Warwick had a microchip – so small that it can rest on a coin – inserted into his arm. His aim: to see how his nervous system could interact with machines and other humans via the Internet. He was able to make a robotic limb move at a university in New York by moving his own hand in England.

Did he come across any unexpected surprises? “One day a sound card was linked to my nervous system, and my colleagues tuned in to Virgin Radio. Unfortunately it was Barry Manilow playing!”. On another occasion, his nervous system was affected by an incoming SMS, thus proving to him that mobiles do affect our body. “I tend to avoid phones,” he says.

He also hooked himself up to his wife – literally – and felt a nervous impulse when she moved her arm. “It’s a very intimate connection – more so than sex,” laughs Warwick. “My wife always said she wouldn’t want me to connect to another woman!”.

But Warwick believes this is how humans must communicate in the future. He openly belittles humans’ limited ways of expression and argues that speech doesn’t convey smell, colour or touch. He says cyborgs – part-machine, part-human – are an inevitable part of humanity in years to come. Anyone who doesn’t get ‘connected’ will be left behind as a subspecies.

On this point, Daniela agrees, but questions how humans might evolve with such technology. “We both agree that the world tomorrow will be a world of cyborgs but we disagree how desirable it will be,” she says. “The last step [of Warwick’s project] is becoming something other than human, and I like humankind.”

Maybe this difference of opinion, for which Warwick is grateful, is why he calls her “the little Devil” on his shoulder.