This talk addresses the historical perspective of human enhancement as stemming from second-order cybernetics, Gregory Bateson, Heinz Von Forester and the Biological Computer Lab. The continued use of computer-based augmentation of human physiology has lead toward human-NBIC enhancement media, but is not limited to this quartet. The media also includes information technologies such as automation, robotics, AI, and simulation processes. Included in this perspective is that the first area of concern for enhancement is that of logic: "We must restrict our focus on the zone where desire and feasibility intersect." (Stock 1992, 97) I frame this sensibility as a second-order enhancement cybernetics, which includes social engineering and individual plasticity. Each person is an enhancement project as well as the observer of the project. Second-order cybernetics suggests that the observer is a necessary aspect of what is being observed; however, it does not assign a behavioral trait to the observer. Like cybernetics, there is a circular system in which feedback provides information which helps us adjust and adapt to change. Unlike cybernetics, the circular loop is spiraling rather than a closed system. This feedback helps us focus on the zone where desire and feasibility intersect and, further, toward develop long-range plans for a posthuman evolution. The relationship between the project, the observer, feedback, and adaptation is further influenced by a fourth attribute—what I introduce as an automorphic behavior within a social ecology. Natasha Vita-More, media artist and theorist, is a frequent guest speaker on topics concerning the future in the international arena. She is best known as designer of "Primo Posthuman". Her writings have been published in numerous books, she has appeared in more than twenty-four televised documentaries, and featured in magazines including The New York Times, Wired, Village Voice, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, U.S. News & World Report, Net Business, and Teleopolis. Natasha is a Fellow of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, Visiting Scholar at 21st Century Medicine, Scientific Board of Lifeboat Foundation, and advises non-profit organizations including Alcor Life Extension Foundation. She was formerly president of Extropy Institute from 2002-2005. As a bit of history, Natasha authored the "Transhuman Statement", Create/Recreate: the 3rd Millennial Culture (cybernetic culture and the future of humanism and the arts and sciences). In the early 1990s, she hosted the TV show "Transcentury UPdate" and was elected to the Green Party as a Los Angeles Councilperson.

1. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT
H e
d
s
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
Natasha Vita-More
PhD Res, Univ. Plymouth
Board of Directors, Humanity+
natasha@natasha.cc

2. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT
H e
d
s
Design Science

3. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT
The project began in the late 1990s with designs for a posthuman
prototype. From 2004 to 2008, the project developed a theory of
human enhancement linking available information on a scientific,
technological and philosophical approach to human futures.
From 2008 to the 2010, the project has been dealing with a
central issue for the near-term—staying alive.

4. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT

5. 1.8 deaths per second worldwide, meaning that there
are over 100 deaths per minute. There are over 150,000
deaths per day and over 55 million deaths per year.
21.6 deaths every 12 seconds

6. PREDICAMENT
The predicament human enhancement faces is
mostly behavioral–what we desire and what is
feasible. Much of this has to do with what we want
to control and why we need to control it.
For human enhancement, the control factor is to stay
alive. One way we can do this is by changing what
is considered as the normal human condition. For
those opposed to enhancement, the control factor is
to die. One way they can do this is to restrain our
condition by keeping disease alive.

7. Symbols Philosophy
Narratives Religion
Visuals Spirituality
Fear Society & Beliefs Hope
Activism Anxiety
Ethics & DESIGN Marketing/
SCIENCE
Culture Culture
Biopolitics Consumers
PRACTICE
Design/Arts NBIC+
& Sciences AI/AGI
Robotics
Science & Technology
Virtuality Whole brain emulation
Simulation Disembodied cognition
Bio-Synthetics connective intelligence

8. Plasticity, Protection,
Preservation
BRAIN
Flexibility, Strength,
BODY Disease Control
Perception, Reflexivity,
BEHAVIOR Connectivity
Cognition Quotient

9. Stay alive
IDEA
Increase Cognition Quotient
MEANS
METHOD The interrelationship of
brain, body and behavior

10. Brain system
Second-order
enhancement plasticity
cybernetics. • Feedback loop
• Adaptation
• Decision assist
The user-agent- • Error correction
observer guides • Multiple viewpoints
• Prosthetic
the enhanced neo-cortex
attributes of its
own system.
automorphic
software
Wearable or in-system
• experience memory
• persona recordation
• relay between avatars

11. ds

12. Designer,
Frog Design Designer,
QIS Design
Designer,
Mikhail St-Denis
Designer,
Pouvan Mokhtarani

13. How to know Self-tracking systems /
well-being
Info links
behavior
What to know
health
Need to know risks
MEMTABLE
Designers, Seth Hunter with Jenny Chan, Katie
Harrington, Emily Zhao, Alexander Milouchev, and Michael Kuo
MEMTABLE
Designers, Sajid Sadi and Marcelo Coelho

14. Info links design process practicality of enhancement
Technology
Evolution
human-technology
integration
HUMAN
HUMAN
Cybernetics ENHANCEMENT Self-directed
ENHANCEMENT
Computer Media NBIC Media
human-futures
conceptualization
Evolution
Design Praxis

15. Info links
Futures
Scenarios
Cybernetics Future Studies
Hu[man]-
machine cyborg transhuman posthuman
Existence Identity Transhumanism
Functionalism Evolution
Metaphysics
Ethics Biopolitics
Philosophy

16. Historical Cybernetics: Establishing a Framework of Human Enhancement
 Historical Praxis of Emerging field of Heds
 Regeneration of Personal Existence as a foundation
 Existence over space and time
 Sciences: Hard and Soft
Human Human Enhancement as a Field
Enhancement  Defining human enhancement
 Relationship to cybernetics
 Free Will, Survival and Evolution
 Regeneration of personal existence
 Existence over space and time
Design Human Enhancement within Practices
Practices
 Locating Evidence of HE in arts
 Assessment of HCI, Body Art, Robotics,
Conceptual Art, Wearables, Performance Art,
Prosthetics, Biological Art
 Comparisons between artistic fields which engage
transdisciplinary media to produce full concept
Technologies Human Enhancement Media
 Media of human enhancement – NBIC+
 Links between Science, Technology and Art
Philosophy Philosophies and Theories of Human Futures
and Theory
 Stemming out of Cybernetics
 Stemming from Transhumanism
 Stemming from Posthumanism
 Analyzing the Cyborg, Transhuman, Posthuman
Future
Designing a Field
Scenarios
 Investigating Experts within fields of NBIC+
 Links to artistic practice and theory
 Future Scenarios of Human Enhancement Media

17. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT
H
H
ee
dd
ss
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
Rise of the Citizen Scientist

18. HUMAN ENHANCEMENT
PROJECT
H e
d
s
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
Natasha Vita-More
PhD Res, Univ. Plymouth
Board of Directors, Humanity+
natasha@natasha.cc