The development of AI technology has been accelerating rapidly. This is a new paradigm, much like the internet and mobile phone, which will have an enormous impact on human society.

Even if humans colonize Mars or other planets, they may want to change their own bodies in order to fit their new environment. Unlike natural selection, these changes would not happen genetically.

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence (AI) has already made its way into many people’s lives. Code-driven systems have transformed the epochs-old activities of daily life, offering new opportunities but also unprecedented threats. Many experts—technology pioneers, developers, business and policy leaders, researchers and activists—are not convinced that AI will leave people better off in the long term.

This concern is based on the notion that AI tools, which are designed or trained to perform a specific task, reflect and act upon the biases of the data they consume at scale. This can be both intentional and unintentional, resulting in the creation of systems that are unable to adapt to unforeseen situations.

The problem is that many AI tools are owned and operated by companies seeking profit or governments seeking power. They are globally networked and largely unregulated, with the potential to be used for nefarious purposes or even to overtake human control.

Amid all the doomsday scenarios involving robot overlords—popular culture examples include Hal 9000 and The Terminator—the more realistic threat comes from narrow AI that is designed or trained to pursue particular goals and unsettle the delicate political and social balance that holds humanity together. We’ve already had a taste of this with the AI algorithms that drive social media platforms, which have been accused of amplifying divisive discourses and fake news in ways that undermine democracy and peace. In the case of Myanmar’s campaign against its Rohingya minority, this may have contributed to the violent eviction of an entire ethnic and religious group.

One example of a weak form of AI is the voice assistants offered by tech giants like Apple and Google, which use voice recognition to respond to queries. Another type of AI, called deep learning, is capable of identifying patterns and trends in large volumes of data and interpreting complex tasks without being explicitly programmed to do so. It is this capability that has led to the development of self-driving cars and medical diagnosis software, as well as an increasing number of jobs being performed by AI programs instead of humans.

Other applications of AI include assisting with detail-oriented work. For instance, the Associated Press has used an AI program that writes short earnings news stories to free up journalists’ time to write more in-depth pieces. The medical field has seen similar innovations, with an AI program called Deep Patient, which can identify up to 80 diseases and predict the onset of symptoms up to a year in advance.

Bionics

The concept of bionics is the application of biological methods and systems found in nature to engineering and modern technology. It is sometimes referred to as biomimetic engineering, but the term bionics is more widely used in science and technology fields. It is also often used to refer to the use of living organisms as technology carriers in industrial production such as using yeast to furnish food proteins, microorganisms to concentrate metals from low-grade ores and the digesting of wastes by bacteria to supply electricity.

Bionics is an interdisciplinary field that draws on many areas of study including biology, engineering, mathematics, medicine and computer science. The field of bionics has been compared to cybernetics, an area of scientific research that seeks to understand and explain intelligent human behavior through models of natural systems.

As with artificial intelligence, the goal of bionics is to develop new technological systems that mimic the functionality of living organisms. Typical examples of this can be found in the development of dirt- and water-repellent paints based on observations of the lotus flower’s innate ability to repel water and dust; hulls that mimic dolphins’ thick skin to reduce noise and abrasions on the ocean surface; sonar, radar, and medical ultrasound imaging devices that utilize the echolocation of bats to detect objects underwater; and the nanostructures and physical mechanisms that produce the shining colors of butterfly wings.

Several technologies fall under the broad umbrella of bionics, but perhaps the most significant is the use of mechanical bionics in prosthetic limbs. These technologies are transforming the lives of disabled people. They enable amputees to walk up flights of stairs, swim and even play basketball with the help of robotic legs and arm attachments.

The bionics in these devices are modeled after the anatomy of real human limbs. They are designed to be lightweight, comfortable and strong enough for a variety of activities. Moreover, they are designed to interact with the user’s natural nervous system and to allow users to control their limbs through thought.

The bionics in these limbs are becoming increasingly sophisticated and are being augmented with AI. This is changing the way people think about the potential of artificially intelligent human augmentation. It is now possible to create a hybrid of humans and machines, a cyborg, that could have unprecedented powers.

Neuroplasticity

Neuroplasticity is the ability of brain circuits to reorganize their connections with each other after learning. This is an important concept in neuroscience because it suggests that the brain isn’t hard-wired with fixed neuronal pathways, but rather that the structure of the brain changes over time. This is an important finding because it implies that the human brain is much more malleable than previously believed, and that our memories, skills, and even personalities are plastic.

Neurons in the brain communicate with each other via electrochemical signals. These signals are sent between neurons in a pattern similar to the way data is transmitted over a computer network. When a nerve cell receives an electrical signal, it releases chemicals that change the shape of a cell’s synaptic connection. The resulting modification is called a synaptic plasticity change, and it can result in either a functional or structural change. A functional change is the activation of a specific neuron or a set of neurons, while a structural change is the increase or decrease in the density of dendritic spines, axonal arboru, synapse size, receptor density, vascularization, and cortical representation.

The plasticity of the brain is a key concept in neural Darwinism, a theory of evolutionary adaptation that suggests that the brain is constantly changing and evolving through experience. This is an alternative to the traditional view that the brain is fixed at birth and that evolution takes a long time to bring about major changes in brain function.

Studies have shown that the brain is not rigid, and that it can change in response to training or injury. This process of reorganization is called neuroplasticity, and it has a number of applications. It can help you break bad habits and learn new skills. It can also help you think more clearly and improve your memory. This is why mental exercises are so beneficial, as they can strengthen the brain and slow age-related decline.

However, this neuroplasticity can only go so far. Non-human animals do show some areas of plasticity, but they cannot reshape their brains in the same way that humans can. In addition, neuroplasticity can only affect biologically available material, so it cannot create new parts of the brain or repurpose existing ones. This limits its effectiveness to enhancing existing cognitive functions and adapting them somewhat for a season.

Genetics

Genetics is the study of genes, their variations, and how they are passed on from one generation to the next. This is the basis for natural selection, which causes gradual changes in organisms over time. It’s why children inherit their parents’ hair color, eye shape, and other physical traits. It’s also why diseases run in families and why babies are born male or female.

DNA is the genetic material that all living things share. Scientists study its structure and function by comparing DNA from different species, finding similarities and differences that allow them to understand evolutionary history. Scientists have also developed new tools to study the DNA of individual cells and the molecular basis for disease. This research has helped scientists pinpoint the emergence of specific attributes over time, such as disease-linked proteins.

With the sequencing of genomes from diverse populations, new insights are being gained in classical topics such as population genetics, genomic selection, and human evolutionary genetics. In addition, phylogenetic analysis is revealing the dynamics of evolution at a finer scale than previously possible, allowing more detailed interpretations of evolutionary trends.

For example, a team of scientists recently discovered 155 microgenes (non-canonical open reading frames) in the human genome. These tiny regions code for proteins that may have no function at all, but they could evolve over time to perform a new, beneficial function. The researchers scanned the genomes of other vertebrates to find out how these microgenes had evolved, and they then compared their results with the human gene sequence to estimate when in evolutionary history the genes had first arisen.

These results fit well with a general model of multiregional human evolution. This theory postulates that, since Homo arose around two million years ago, human genetic diversity has been limited, despite the fact that we share a common ancestor with chimpanzees and other apes; genetic variation within humans occurs mainly between regions, not between them; and there have been universal directional trends in certain characters such as brain size, but with regional variation persisting for some characters such as hair color.