Carey Born
First Born Films In UK cinemas on 20 September; US to be announced
Neil Harbisson studied music composition at Dartington College of Arts in the UK. He was born with achromatopsia, so is unable to perceive colour of any kind. Not one to ignore a challenge, in 2003 Harbisson recruited product designer Adam Montandon to build him a head-mounted rig that turns colours into musical notes that he can listen to via earphones.
Now in his 40s, Harbisson has evolved. The sound generator and an attached camera on a pencil-thin stalk are permanently fused to the back of his skull. He hears colours through bone conduction.
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If, indeed, 鈥渉ears鈥� is the word. Watching Carey Born鈥檚 Cyborg: A documentary, we sometimes catch Harbisson talking intelligently about the senses. He doesn鈥檛 hear colour so much as see it, because his visual cortex interprets the information directly, much as practised Braille readers don鈥檛 go through a stage of interpreting sensations of touch. His colour organ is startling: what is that antenna on the back of that chap鈥檚 head? But Harbisson is used to it, and his brain treats its input like any other visual information.
Body modification in art has a long, rather vexed history. I recall performance artist Stelarc suspended from flesh hooks, pronouncing on the body鈥檚 obsolescence. He doesn鈥檛 do that sort of thing now. As he nears 80, you can declare victory over the flesh as much as you like: time gets the last laugh.
It is endearingly old-fashioned 鈥� as though the body's plasticity wasn't already a burning social issue
The way Harbisson hacked his own perception leaves him with very little to do but talk about his experiences. He can鈥檛 demonstrate them, unlike his partner, Moon Ribas. The dancer-choreographer has a vibrating, internet-enabled gadget in her left arm that tells her how to respond to real-time earthquake data. The bigger the vibrations, the stronger the quake, and this guides her dancing.
Harbisson, however, is stuck explaining what it is like to have friends transmit the colours of an Australian sunset to the back of his skull. Using the same rig he has, they send a signal that generates a tone that is a specific colour to him. To which one radio show guest objects: couldn鈥檛 they just send him a postcard instead?
Born never digs into this very sensible question. It is a pity. Harbisson says he weathered months-long headaches and episodes of depression in an effort to extend his senses, but all outsiders care about is the tech.
A recent novelty created by Harbisson and his collaborators is a headband that tells the time by heating spots on your skull. Obviously, a watch offers a more accurate measure. Less obviously, the device is meant to create a new sense in its wearer, an embodied, pre-conscious awareness of solar-planetary motion. The tech is fun, but what matters is the idea.
I find it slightly irksome to explain Harbisson鈥檚 work when he hardly bothers. For over 20 years, he has offered his audience what they now expect: a ringing endorsement of transhumanism, the philosophy that would have us treat our bodies as malleable meat.
Harbisson and Ribas co-created the Cyborg Foundation and the Transpecies Society to give a voice to cyborgs and others with non-human identities. An endearingly old-fashioned approach, it is as though the body鈥檚 plasticity wasn鈥檛 already a burning social issue, and a weapon in our culture wars.
I wish Born had challenged her subject. Penetrate their shell of schooled ego and you may find conceptual artists have a surprising amount to say.
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Simon Ings is a novelist and science writer. Follow him on X @simonings
