By Calder McHugh
May , 2026
Introduction:
Read more here: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine ... 0900799(Politico) There will come a time, in the not-so-distant future, when you decide to stick a computer chip in your brain.
At least, that’s what D. Scott Phoenix told the audience at TED 2026 in Vancouver last month.
“Someone you work with will get it first. And you’ll hold out for a while, the way you did with the smartphone. But eventually, you won’t,” said Phoenix, dressed in all black with a tiny mic attached to his ear. “The advantages of integration will be hard to compete with.”
Put bluntly, in his view, “We’re on the cusp of the next major transition, the merger of humans and AI.”
This perspective, as outlandish as it may sound, is commonly held in Silicon Valley. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman mused way back in 2017 that “a merge is probably our best-case scenario” for survival after the emergence of superhuman AI. Tech billionaire Peter Thiel is a vocal advocate of “transhumanism.”
caltrek’s comment: I can almost imagine all sorts of science fiction books and movies centered on this theme. For example, a civil war between those with implants and those without based on how said implants radically transform recipients understanding of the world, including their loyalties.