Posthuman Designs

Posthuman designsBy Andy Miah

This paper explores the ethics of human enhancement by considering various manifestations of design. It argues that designart enters the biopolitical sphere, thus reconstituting the parameters of moral debates on human enhancements. Drawing on a wide variety of aesthetic forms that engage ethical concerns about such modifications, the paper considers the substantive ethical arguments that are articulated through such artifacts.

Multi-limbed Pacific Tree frog

Stelarc: third hand

Stelarc: 1/4 scale ear

Olivier Goulet: Skin

Bob Dylan: We’re different. We come from two different worlds. You come from England; I come from the United States.

Interviewer: That’s true, that’s true, but we’re still human beings, so there’s some sort of connection between us.

Bob Dylan: No, I’m just a guitar player, that’s all.

From the film (1967) Don’t Look Back

The Reactable,designed at University of Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, used by Bjork on 2008 tour

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0h-RhyopUmc&feature=related

the bionic athlete

TED FRIEDMANN(WADA Gene Therapy)

H. LEE SWEENEY(IGF-1 mice)

Tommy John’s Surgery

Oscar Pistorius, Cheetah legs

Aimee Mullins, Photo by Nick Knight

Cremaster 3, Matthew Barney (dir)

design

Telephone tooth implantAuger & Loizeau

bioethics and culture

The ethics of stem cell research

Fukuyama, F. and F. Furger (2007). Beyond Bioethics: A Proposal for

Modernizing the Regulation of Human Biotechnologies. Washington, D.C.

“there are several deeply held alternative views on this issue, over

which it is not likely that there will be consensus any time in the near

future”

‘we cannot survey the possibilities we cannot imagine’ (Sorenson)

We cannot apply our imagination far enough without thinking about enhancement questions

To conclude