麻豆传媒

In 麻豆传媒 we often write about the future technological enhancement of humans, but some enhancements are already with us. Jessica Griggs talks to actress, model, athlete and double amputee Aimee Mullins and discovers how technology is changing the way society views people with physical impairments

Gallery: Prosthetics with aesthetics

What can you do with your legs that I can鈥檛 do with mine?

Like the sprinter Oscar Pistorius, I was born without fibula bones, and my legs were amputated below the knee. I now have 12 pairs of prosthetic legs. My Cheetah legs are very functional, and I use them only for sprinting, biking or swimming. Right now I鈥檓 in my 鈥淩obocop鈥� legs, which have a shock absorber and a spring. Then I have four pairs of cosmetic legs made of silicone. These are incredibly human-looking, with veins, hair follicles and tendons. They鈥檙e made for different heel heights. If I come home from a month in Italy or Paris I have a suitcase just full of legs because I need options for different clothing.

What made you realise that you wanted more than just a standard medical prosthetic?

As a teenager I went to Madame Tussauds wax museum in London and saw a model of Jerry Hall. Everything was exactly replicated 鈥� the skin tone, the eye colour 鈥� and it looked amazing. At that point I was wearing legs designed to be worn with orthopaedic shoes 鈥� I mean what 17-year-old is going to wear an orthopaedic shoe? I realised I was talking to the wrong people about prosthetics. I needed to find the guys in Hollywood who were building the Terminator, or the guys from the wax museums 鈥� people who don鈥檛 come with the traditional view of doctors and prosthetists of how a prosthetic should look.

Do you feel more comfortable wearing legs that are human-looking?

I don鈥檛 have any issue wearing legs that aren鈥檛 human-like, but I want the option to have human-looking legs. This is part of a shift in the way disability is viewed, the idea that individuality and personal choice are important. How many colours do iPods come in? Apple doesn鈥檛 presuppose everyone wants a white one, and any prosthetic is like that, just like glasses. Now they鈥檙e called eyewear because they鈥檙e a fashion item, but not long ago they were seen as a medical device.

Has anyone ever referred to you as a cyborg?

For me that term means not human. I don鈥檛 like it. In the 15 years I鈥檝e had a public persona, people have called me all kinds of things 鈥� trans-human, post-human, a cyborg. Is someone who wears contact lenses a cyborg? If we think of a cellphone or a pair of scissors as a prosthetic because they are augmenting our limbs, are we cyborgs when we use them?

Is technology bringing us closer to the point where disability can become super-ability?

Absolutely. We are already there with laser eye surgery. We don鈥檛 even consider people who are visually impaired disabled any more. There isn鈥檛 the stigma around wearing glasses that there was in the 1940s and 1950s. The technology gives us super-ability.

The golfer Arnold Palmer couldn鈥檛 have continued to play without his replacement titanium hip and Tiger Woods has had laser eye surgery twice. This gave him 20/15 vision 鈥� even better than 鈥減erfect鈥� 20/20 and a clear advantage for someone who plays a target sport. People are living much longer now and looking to technology to help push their bodies beyond their natural limit. That could be technology to aid and even augment ability that might have once been compromised with amputation or visual impairment, hearing impairment or ageing.

How far can you push the concept? Should people be able to augment themselves in any way they want?

They already are. If someone wants to get 50 piercings or modify their bodies by putting carbon horns under their skin then they can. Do we call them into the ethical debate about that? Then there鈥檚 plastic surgery. It鈥檚 not just semantics that we say breast 鈥渁ugmentation鈥�. Having a prosthetic in any other part of the body would be assumed to be connected with disability, but here we call it augmentation because we have decided that it is pleasing.

There鈥檚 a super-strength hearing aid on the market in the US. The adverts say you can sit on your front porch and hear people across the street talking. People who buy this will not be those who need hearing aids but those that want to eavesdrop. That鈥檚 augmented hearing sold under the guise of a hearing aid because eavesdropping is illegal. How far could you push this concept? I think it鈥檚 limitless.

What problems did you come up against as a professional athlete and bilateral amputee?

The first time I competed against other amputees I won everything, but the authorities said: 鈥淭his isn鈥檛 fair. Technically, with two prosthetics she could be as tall as she wants to lengthen her stride.鈥� So I made myself shorter than I would be naturally but I got even faster because my centre of gravity was lower. They quickly shut up.

It鈥檚 rare to be a bilateral amputee. If you鈥檙e missing one limb, the idea is that you build another to achieve symmetry. A bilateral amputee can鈥檛 do that, so why look to human legs for inspiration for the prosthetic? Why not look at the fastest thing that runs? A Cheetah leg doesn鈥檛 touch the energy output of a real leg but it鈥檚 the best prosthetic available.

So how come you still broke world records?

It鈥檚 not just the legs, it鈥檚 me too! You鈥檙e forgetting that there鈥檚 a human being on top of these things. I began running at school and had to be fast enough to compete against able-bodied children, so my fast-twitch muscles developed early on. What infuriated me about last year鈥檚 ban on Cheetah legs (since overturned) was the assumption that your performance is just down to the legs. I was a very good athlete but Oscar Pistorius is on another level 鈥� he鈥檚 so gifted. The fact people want to negate that doesn鈥檛 make sense to me.

So what鈥檚 the solution?

If we鈥檙e going to have a conversation about augmentation in sport we need to look at all sports. No one has questioned Tiger Woods鈥檚 eye surgery. Do you hear anyone question people playing sport with a titanium hip or those new ultra-streamlining swimsuits?

Where is the line between drug-induced enhancement and robotic enhancement?

It is essential to understand that someone who runs with prosthetics is not analogous to someone who dopes with steroids. Even the implication that we are cheating by wearing a prosthetic is dangerous. The Cheetah legs are in no way an enhancement. They don鈥檛 even touch what human legs can do.

鈥淚t鈥檚 not enhancement 鈥� Cheetah legs don鈥檛 touch what human legs can do鈥�

Is disability an individual鈥檚 mindset or a reflection of the society they live in?

It鈥檚 always society that disables the human. I don鈥檛 mean that just in the sense of people without limbs; you can bring it back to gender and race politics. What鈥檚 happening now with people with physical impairments is similar to what was happening with race 50 or 60 years ago in the US. The status quo is being challenged, people know something is shifting but they鈥檙e not sure quite what to do with it.

Gallery: Prosthetics with aesthetics