Will computers and human beings merge?
I actually have a slide in my talk that showed a computer that interfaces with us as a genetically designed species. If we can capture how diatoms lay down their silica circuits, we should be able to write a genetic code for making a computer chip – one that has nice interfaces for us as a species.
What do you mean – nice interfaces?
We can expand the power of the human mind by having plug-in modules. If you want to learn to speak French, you use your silica-based computer that is genetically driven – whether it’s a small, add-on chip that gets planted in the back of our skulls, or it’s something engineered into us. Our biggest limitation is mental. I would be happy to have five times the brain capacity I have. As I get older, any increase would be nice. If we came up with a magic pill to increase our memory, people would take it. And if there is some genetic engineering that would work, I think most people would do it. That is the direction that humanity will ultimately go, for sure.
But that’s still the future. In the near term, most of the focus will be on things like limb regeneration and eliminating late-onset dementia.
Limb regeneration?
Yes, A lot of other species do it, and a lot of these processes are based on stem cells. If we don’t understand stem cells, which are the translators of the genetic code, then we are wasting our time trying to understand the genetic code. There is probably nothing more important to study about human biology than stem cells. The fact that it has been blocked by the Bush Administration on religious grounds is one of the intellectual tragedies of the century.
From an interview with Craig Venter, genetics pioneer, Rolling Stone Magazine, 11/15/2007
Piece of Mindful 
Mark, are you sure you didn’t meant to file this in Science Fiction?
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Organ regeneration is the whole point of stem cell research.
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Stem cells are not computer chips. Human beings as organisms are much more open, complex systems than brain research alone can discern. Cells, skin, bones, fascia, muscle, organs, all are integrated aspects of coherent being. Consciousness and/or “mind” is more than physical “gray matter.” Ongoing research in all areas of science and technology is to be commended and encouraged, but we are nowhere near aware enough at this point to figure out what evolution has created, how or why. Hubris gets in the way.
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I missed the point of your post. I might blame it on the flu, but that’s just an innocent “bug,” whereas George W. Bush is not. I was reacting to Craig Venter’s remark:
“We can expand the power of the human mind by having plug-in modules.” That’s science fiction, not stem cell research.
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I agree, he’s a dreamer, and he has a lot of faith in his scientific wherewithal. I doubt we’ll see any cyberborgs soon. But I do have great hope for stem cell research in curing some very common maladies, like Alzheimer’s. I don’t think I’m being overly optimistic, but you could be right – it could be nothing more than daydreaming.
This flu … there was an especially nasty strain going around Denver – 24 hour incubation – really knocked people for a loop. Anything like that?
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William Gibson writes about such a future in his techno novels, and it is weird and scary indeed, but all very plausible. In two hundred years, God knows what will be possible.
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