Transhumanism, Deus Ex, and The Future

As many of you know I am a big fan of transhumanism. What was once purely sci-fi is now becoming a reality as we move forward in the fields of prosthetics and do-it-yourself augmentation (check out my blog post on what people are altering themselves with these days). It's possible that many of us will see a world where people and machines become synonymous, and it's not that far away.

Fiction and art has predicted this for a long time. In the writing of William Gibson to Neil Stephenson, and in a plethora of movies and games (Terminator, Star Trek: First Contact, etc.), visions of the possible futures as we go down this path can be found. In my Chronicles of the Orion Spur series (Blood Siren, Keltan's Gambit, the upcoming books) it is considered strange to not be part-machine.

Although I've never played the series, Deus Ex is a video game franchise that presents another version of this theme. The new one, Deus Ex Mankind Divided, presents us with a possible near-future reality rendered in beautiful, next generation graphics. Below is a featurette worth a watch even if you're not a gamer. The world set up alone is worth it.
(Video links to IGN.COM, you may have to enable the external content to see the video, or you can see it here)