Talk:Cyborg

From Academic Kids

Bold textI want to be a cyborg.

Anyways.. cyborg is basically defines as adding technology onto living beings in order to enhance or make them more capable of doing things an average being of their species wouldn't be able to do. I can't see through walls however a bionical eye could help me. Having any type of technological devices added onto me that could relay information or process it and then give a command would create me into a cyborg. And yeah that blind startrek dude was a cyborg. And also an artifical heart is a cybernetic part. "Machines dehumanize..." - Kilroy

p.s. i'm into linguistics and funny enough so are you.. you deciphered it... ^_^ maybe they are linguistic experts.. o_o nihongo wo hanasu ka.

A more specific definition could an organic life form which has artificial machines controled by its nerves. A machine with organic components grown on to it might also be considered a cyborg. In the movies a cyborg is someone with both characteristics of a person, and characteristics of a machine.

I would like to suggest that the word "portmanteau" be replaced by the words "formed from" because most persons looking up "cyborg" will probably not be linguistic specialists. I know that while I love expanding my (very large) vocabulary, unneeded complications get in the way of my best us of this very wonderful encycloped project.209.181.120.4

Defining Cyborg

I was wondering how exactly the term cyborg would be defined - especially in the fictional realm? I know in the article cyborg is defined as "...designate a creature which is a mixture of organic and mechanical parts."

In the strictest sense, it sounds like it would make anyone who has any sort of artifical implant or replacement parts a cyborg. Take for example Star Trek. For example, Jean-Luc Picard and Geordi La Forge have artifical implants. Picard has an artifical heart that replaced his real heart which was damaged in a fight. La Forge was born blind, and was given sight via artifical implants. Would they be considered cyborgs because they have these mechanical part? Here would we look at a strict definition of the term, or something else?

JesseG 07:30, Nov 15, 2004 (UTC)

Um, as they say on Slashdot, "RTFA":

"According to some definitions of the term, the metaphysical and physical attachments humanity has with even the most basic technologies have already made us cyborgs. In a typical example, a human fitted with a heart pacemaker might be considered a cyborg, since s/he is incapable of surviving without the mechanical part." (and so on)

The article should, and does, discuss this very ambiguity, not confine itself to one "strict" definition. The fact that it is ambiguous is interesting in itself. - IMSoP 18:49, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC) [PS: I know this is an old question, but the article section quoted has not been changed since before then]

some of the guys in the examples aren't cyborgs

masterchief isn't a cyborg, he is just a guy in a suit, and terminator is completely a robot, only covered with organic stuff because of space-travel limitations (that's why he came "now" naked)

And AFAIK droids are simple robots, not cyborgs.

The details at Master Chief (Halo)#Character history seem to pretty clearly fit just about any definition of "cyborg" to me: having "Advanced carbide ceramic material grafted onto bones to increase durability" is a lot more than being "a guy in a suit".

T-800 contains similarly persuasive clues that at least that model of Terminator used genuine living skin; I'd say making flesh and skin "work" around an artificial skeleton is pretty much mixing organic and artificial (although from the other direction, as it were, compared to most examples). This one's more open to interpretation, I guess, but it seems to me that it's more than "covered with" "organic stuff", it's a pretty intrinsic part of him.

As for droids, I can't see to what you're referring; if you mean the listing of "Admiral Screed", note that "Droids" is the name of the cartoon, in which s/he was presumably a character. - IMSoP 19:37, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)