Welcome to the latest installment of “Writer Fuel – cool real-world stories that might inspire your little writer heart. Check out our Writer Fuel page on the LimFic blog for more inspiration. Today:
Fictional cyborgs are found everywhere, from the silver screen to comics and novels. But who was the first real-life bionic human?
To answer this question, let’s direct our attention to Kevin Warwick, who has a scar on his left forearm from where surgeons fired 100 silicon spikes, tipped with platinum electrodes, directly into his nervous system. These spikes allowed his body to receive outside electronic signals — for instance, from a computer — and transmit them out again.
This operation arguably made Warwick the first cyborg in 2002, by fusing his body with technology to extend his regular human abilities into the realm of science fiction. With the implant, he could be wired up to computers, control robots on other continents via the internet and sense ultrasonic sound waves, just like a bat can.
