Human as a process: What awaits us in the coming age of bio-enhancement?

Just as the groundwork for the internet was laid decades before its widespread use, many scientists believe the technologies that will usher in the era of human customisation and augmentation are being developed in labs today. Moving far beyond the prevention of genetic illness and advanced prosthetics for those who need them, these rapidly emerging technologies could – to borrow a phrase from Daft Punk – make it possible for anyone (with deep pockets) to be harder, better, faster, stronger. This delightful animation imagines the more bizarre enhancements future humans might desire, and hears the US engineer and ethicist Braden Allenby and biomedical engineer Conor Walsh consider how a coming wave of automation, robotics and biomedical enhancements could fundamentally alter the trajectory of our species – and even reframe what it means to be human.