Publications
Partners
Neil Harbisson, the first human cyborg, listens to colours and chooses his outfits by what it sounds like and not what it looks like.
What might seem like a statement made during an acid trip, City Press can assure its readers that the author was not on any mind-altering substances while writing this piece.
Instead, we attended a one-day conference by analytics and data management company SAS titled “Road to AI”, where cyborg artist Harbisson was the keynote speaker.
The colour-blind Harbisson has an antenna implanted into his skull that detects colours and sends the wavelengths via internal vibrations to his ears.
He then interprets these sound waves and can tell what colour shirt someone is wearing by the frequencies he hears.
The antenna – which looks like a reading lamp – protrudes from the back of his head to hover just above his forehead.
“I indentify myself as a cyborg,” Harbisson says to the crowd.
“The definition of human does not define me 100% so I don’t feel human because there’s an organ, an antenna, that is not typically human [in me].”
The 33-year-old artist has been living with the antenna since 2004 and despite the initial headaches, his body and his brain have taken to the “technological organ” with ease.
Harbisson had to learn what different frequencies emitted by his antenna meant and he memorised these so that he could identify the different colours. He is still colourblind and would not want this to change, he says, because “seeing in greyscale has its advantages”.
“We can see much better at night, we can see longer distances and we can memorise shapes more easily as colour doesn’t distract us from the shape. Also photo copies are cheaper in black and white,” the enthusiastic Harbisson jokes.
He entertained the audience with funny anecdotes of how humans (the ones who have not upgraded their bodies) view him when they first meet him.
“Having an antenna in my head means that I have been stopped every single day in the street by strangers since 2004 and people ask what this is. In 2004 most people thought it was a reading light and they would ask me if I could turn on the light. In 2007/2008 people thought it was a hands-free telephone and they thought I was on the phone. In 2009 many people thought it was a GoPro and that I was filming my life, so many people waved at me thinking that I was filming them. In 2016 many people shouted at me “Pokemon” and they tried to catch me,” he said to roars of laughter from the crowd.
Harbisson also works closely with NASA because his “antenna organ” has an internet connection that can connect to their satellites.
This allows him to “listen” to colours in space, while his feet are firmly stuck on earth.
“When I do this my sense of colour is no longer on earth, it’s outside this planet and this allows me to explore space and the colours of space without having to go there. I call this becoming a ‘Sensetranaut’.”
For the full interview with Neil Harbisson and to learn about how humans are taking the next evolutionary step, get your copy of City Press this Sunday
