“I’VEHADANANTENNA
for over adecadenow and itwouldbeweirdnot to
haveone,” saysNeil Harbisson. TheBritish-born artistwas bornwithout the
ability to see colour – adisability that his cybernautic implant allows him to
circumnavigate. “It allowsme toperceive colour through vibrations inmy
head that become sounds inmy ears,”he says. “At the very beginning the
aimwas toperceive visual colours, but it has allowedme to seeultraviolet
and infrared too.”Harbissonuses his new sense tomake art,makinghim
theworld’s first cyborg artist. Henowwants to inspiremorepeople to join
him inextending their senses. “Peoplehaven’t realisedhow important that
is. Ifwe couldextendhearing to infrasound, below20Hz, for example,we
could communicatewithelephants, or sense a tsunami coming.” Tohim,
his situation is similar to that of transsexuals in the 1950s and ’60s. “Then
peoplewhowanted a sex changeneeded tofindpeoplewilling todo it
anonymously. It’s the samewith cyborgoperations,which aren’t generally
acceptedby bioethics committees. There areobviously risks, but ifwe
don’t start exploring the technology ourselves,we’ll never know.”
NeilHarbisson
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