Tag Archives: cyborg

An evening of prosthetic reality

Prosthetic envy. That was the theme of the Virtual Futures Salon at the end of last month.

Three out of four panellists had prosthetic limbs and were keen to talk openly about what that meant for them. One of them was James A.H. Young who you may have seen on the BBC recently.

They told their stories, pondered and discussed what had led to them having prosthetics, how good their limbs actually are and what the general public’s reaction is like.

Surprisingly, they had stories of people exlaiming how ‘cool’ the prosthetics are and asking how they could get one. To which, of course, there’s a reply which includes, ‘you’ll have to cut a limb off first.’

Luke Robert Mason introduced the evening, referring to Limbo ’90, which is a book I read as part of my research for the evening’s story, Loans for Limbs. It’s a 1950 book by Bernard Wolfebilled as being the first book to “project the present-day concept known as ‘cybernetics’ to its logical and terrifying conclusion.” It’s well worth a read.

Here’s me reading Loans for Limbs for the first time in public.

Afterwards, some of the audience asked me how to get a written copy; if you join my mailing list before 17 June you’ll get it in the June email a few days later.


If you liked this you might also like the free near-future collection: S{t}imulation, Foodflix and Joined At The Chip.


photo credit: Roboarm via photopin (license)

Make Me As You See Me

‘Freaks!’

Roger and Dimitri were holding hands and had been ever since they’d grafted their skin together to show the world they were a couple. After hours of intimate debate they’d decided that permanently holding hands was the most powerful symbol they could think of.

‘Up yours, body beige,’ shouted Roger.

They raised their clasped hands in a fist salute and with their free hands they touched the lips of the Picasso masks they were both wearing and gave the group of jeering men the middle finger.

A young woman with a tough-girl walk spat on the ground in front of them.

‘Thank you for your kind offering,’ he said and stepped over it. They’d provoked this sort of anger ever since they’d started to change their bodies. Others, more sadly in their view, had simply copied their modifications. Even more depressing was the banal media tittle tattle about their day to day bodily functions. He adjusted his mask. ‘Fuckers. It still upsets me,’ he whispered.

Surgically attached to his inner arm was a perfectly scaled clone of Dimitri’s left ear. He stroked it and Dimitri smiled as the gadgetry transmitted the feeling from the clone to his real ear.

It was their opening night and fans had gathered outside the gallery. As they approached some of the fans lifted their arms to show copy-cat cloned ears and a few had even gone as far as joining their hands together.

Roger sighed and patted his stomach. ‘Shall we?’ Continue reading

The driverless car’s dilemma

‘Mummy!’ screamed her five-year old daughter.

She looked up from her iPad. ‘What now?’

‘Look!’

Through the windscreen she saw a group of children crossing the road slowly, sliding around on the ice.

The driverless car wasn’t braking.

She’d forgotten to ask the hire company if this model was programmed to prioritise pedestrians or passengers. It would make a choice – her daughter or the kids playing in the road – but she didn’t know which one.

She could override it by taking control of the steering. But, her driving ability was far inferior to the car’s algorithm. She glanced at the rock face on one side and the cliff edge on the other.

He daughter screamed again, ‘Mummy!’

She grabbed the wheel.


A driverless car has to choose between passengers and pedestrians. Which will it be? #SciFi Share on X

If you liked this you might also like S{t}imulation, Foodflix and Joined At The Chip. The three free stories in the collection, Human Enhancement: Sex, Drugs and Marriage.


photo credit: Highway 101 via photopin (license)