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As
humanity journeys further into a technological revolution that
its leaders say will change every aspect of our lives,
opportunities abound to transform the ways our bodies operate
from guarding against cancer to turbo-charging the brain.
The Opinium Research survey of 14,500 people in 16 countries
including Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Spain showed that
63% of people would consider augmenting their bodies to improve
them, though the results varied across Europe.
In Britain, France and Switzerland, support for augmentation was
low - at just 25%, 32% and 36% respectively - while in Portugal
and Spain it was much higher - at 60% in both.
"Human augmentation is one of the most significant technology
trends today," said Marco Preuss, European director of global
research and analysis at Kaspersky, a Moscow-based cybersecurity
firm.
"Augmentation enthusiasts are already testing the limits of
what's possible, but we need commonly agreed standards to ensure
augmentation reaches its full potential while minimising the
risks," Preuss said.
Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk's neuroscience startup
Neuralink last month unveiled a pig named Gertrude that has had
a coin-sized computer chip in its brain for two months, showing
off an early step toward the goal of curing human diseases with
the same type of implant.
The survey found that most people wanted any human augmentation
to work for the good of humanity, though there were concerns
that it would be dangerous for society and open to exploitation
by hackers.
The survey showed the majority of people felt that only the rich
would be able to get access to human augmentation technology.
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Kate Holton)
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