Sep 13, 2022
Author Harry Parker visits Google to discuss his book "Hybrid
Humans: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Man and Machine". This
book is a gripping, eye-opening firsthand account of how technology
is altering our understanding of what it means to be human.
Harry Parker’s life changed overnight when he lost his legs to a
bomb in Afghanistan. He now wears prosthetic legs from the moment
he wakes up to the moment he goes to bed, reliant on them to move
about the world. The tech he relies on is now so advanced it can
seem as good, if not better, than human biology. But the benefits
and freedom it gives him come with costs: the cost of pain, of
damage to his body, of being stared at and being seen as other, of
anxiety and dependence.
In "Hybrid Humans", Parker takes us on a journey at the frontiers
of man and machine, meeting those pushing the limits of our bodies
and brains—the former soldiers having cutting-edge
osseointegration, the very first DIY cyborgs and biohackers
tinkering in garages, and the scientists, surgeons, artists, and
disabled pioneers developing the latest robotics and implants.
Grappling with his own new identity and disability along the way,
Parker traces how new technologies might lead us to powerful,
liberating possibilities for what a body can be—and how to be human
is to be hybrid.
Visit YouTube.com/TalksatGoogle to watch the video.