Upgrade Me: Our Amazing Journey to Human 2.0 - Hardcover

Clegg, Brian

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312371578 ISBN 13: 9780312371579

Publisher: St. Martin's Press, 2008

Synopsis

Biologically, human beings haven’t changed in 100,000 years – but thanks to our amazing brains we can upgrade ourselves to add capabilities that took other creatures millions of years to evolve. Thanks to this “unnatural” evolution we are already Human 2.0. In the effort to stay alive, reproduce and make more of brains, we have transformed ourselves. Now with a better understanding of the mechanisms of the body, cloning, gene therapy, bionics, and other technologies, our rate of change is getting ever faster. This process of upgrading is nothing new. It has been around for millennia, and it raises some provocative questions. What will the future hold? Will our drive to upgrade continue to give positive benefits, or will it result in destruction? Where is our evolutionary survival heading? Sure to cause much debate, UPGRADE ME is science journalist Brian Clegg's ambitious and brilliant account of humanity's need to upgrade

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

In biological terms human beings haven’t evolved in 100,000 years – but thanks to our amazing brains we are able to upgrade ourselves to add capabilities that have taken other creatures millions of years to evolve. Thanks to this “unnatural” evolution we are already Human 2.0. In the effort to live longer, become more attractive to the opposite sex, to be better able to defend ourselves, to make the most of our brains and to repair damaged bodies we have transformed ourselves. Now with a better understanding of the mechanisms of the body, cloning, gene therapy, bionics, and other technologies, our rate of change is becoming ever faster. This process of upgrading is nothing new. It has been around for millennia. UPGRADE ME is science journalist Brian Clegg's ambitious and brilliant account of humanity’s self-driven evolution from the earliest addition of the artificial skin of clothing to cloning human organs and using nanotechnology to keep our bodies going indefinitely. What will the future hold for us? Will our drive to upgrade continue to give positive benefits, or will it result in the destruction of our humanity? Where is our evolutionary survival heading? Mankind's fate in relation to the Earth is today's most pervasive question in science.

About the Author:

BRIAN CLEGG is the author of THE GOD EFFECT, A BRIEF HISTORY OF INFINITY, THE FIRST SCIENTIST: A Life of Roger Bacon, and LIGHT YEARS: The Extraordinary Story of Mankind's Fascination with Light.  He lives in Wiltshire, England, with his wife and two children.

About this edition

• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0312371578
• ISBN 13: 9780312371579
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320