One color-blind artist has had an'eyeborg' antenna implanted directly into his skull to enable him to'hear' color - and his friend has had implants in her feet to allow her to'feel' earthquakes. The two are'transhumanists', a growing movement of people who hope to add new abilities to their bodies using technology - with Elon Musk claiming that technology such as his Neuralink implant could enhance human memories or even allow humans to live forever as man-machine hybrids. The rapid evolution of artificial intelligence has sparked a new interest in the idea of surgically modified humans. In a new documentary due out this year, Cyborg, Neil Harbisson, who is the world's first legally recognized cyborg thanks to his color-hearing implant, says, 'This is happening!' and hopes that technology will allow humans to'self-design' their bodies. Neil Harbisson, the world's first legally recognised cyborg thanks to his color-hearing implant (First Born Films) Hrbisson advocates for'non-human' identities (First Born Films) Director Carey Born said that she had heard of a'cyborg' who had been surgically altered to hear color, emailed Harbisson and decided to make a documentary about'transhumanists' - believing it's important that the tech doesn't fall into the wrong hands.

I remember the first time I was introduced to the concept of synesthesia. I was in seventh grade, sitting in the dark, watching an educational video about the neuroscience of the phenomenon in lieu of our typical life science coursework. A British woman with lexical-gustatory synesthesia appeared on screen to describe the way every name she'd ever spoken had a different taste. Many of the particulars of the documentary have faded in the decade since I last saw it, but I still recall the woman saying "the name Catherine tastes like chocolate cake." For years, I have wished (perhaps unfairly) that I had synesthesia, a rare neurological condition where senses enterwine.