subject: Cyborgs and Androids: What is the Difference? [print this page] Cyborgs and Androids: What is the Difference?
By now one would think that the difference between cyborgs and androids should be pretty clear, but that still doesn't seem to be the case. If you think that the Terminator was a cyborg, you would be mistaken. He belongs to a special class of robots known as androids. But the Borg in Star Trek's Next Generation are Cyborgs, and I'll tell you why.
A cyborg really isn't a robot except in a limited, functional sense. A cyborg needs to be a fusion of living organic matter with mechanical parts. Not only that, it should have an organic brain as well; in fact, this is all it needs to be a cyborg. And, strange as it may seem, someone with an artificial heart may be considered a cyborg. We may even go so far to say that hearing aides, and even telephones are a part of cyborg technology. What if you had organic matter grafted onto machines however? Would that be considered a cyborg? I think the answer is no, but it is an interesting question and someday we'll have to create an answer for it.
Did you know that a robot must have artificial intelligence but a computer or a microchip is not required for a machine to be considered a robot? At its simplest level, a robot is simply an automated machine with a sensor device. We are surrounded by robots. If an extremely sophisticated robot could be created that spoke and looked like a human, it would be called an android. Many amusement parks have these, but they are too 'mannequin-like' to be considered androids.
Androids are the subject of many science fiction films, and the suggestion is often that somehow they are 'alive' or intelligent. But in my opinion, artificial intelligence is just that- artificial. But are binary-based conscious beings actually possible? In the present, I don't think so. But what constitutes a mind that is self-aware and replete with a continuous emotional state? What is a soul? Modern science evades these questions almost with hostility. In fact, science is incapable of answering them. The possibility of cyber life forms remains a possibility.
