Social Microbial Prosthesis - Towards Super-Organism Centered Design

In this paper, I speculate on a future where our need to socialize physically is solely to exchange bacteria. With our biological data being in the hands of private companies and governments and our environments’ microbiomes becoming less diverse, our social systems, social identities and social interactions are redefined and reinvented to adapt to this new reality. In this world, everyone wears a “social microbial prosthesis” that analyzes their microbial composition from their breath and reveals sensitive information on their chest. The microbial prosthesis would be able to give off information not only on the microbial composition but also on the mental and physical health of a person. This second skin plays a role in controlling communication and interaction between people, where one is able to, by inspecting surrounding people’s prosthesis, take careful considerations of who to interact with and who to avoid. Social Microbial Prosthesis is a critique of the race of private companies and governments to collect our biological data, the role of commercializing such data in shaping and changing our social identities and a response to the loss of microbial diversity in our environments due to our modern lifestyles and surroundings.

Content

Author and article information

Contributors

Karen El Asmar

Conference

Publication date: June 2019

Publication date (Print): June 2019

Pages: 78-82

Affiliations

[0001]Parsons School of Design

The New School, New York, NY

Article

DOI: 10.14236/ewic/POM19.12

SO-VID: 3712a48e-b2b0-4556-9cef-a98f56531d8f

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Conference name: Politics of the Machine Beirut 2019

Conference acronym: POM2019

Conference number: 2

Conference location: Beirut, Lebanon

Conference date: 11-14 June 2019

Conference sponsor: Electronic Workshops in Computing (eWiC)

Conference theme: Politics of the Machine

History

Product

1477-9358 BCS Learning & Development

Self URI (article page): https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/POM19.12

Self URI (journal page): https://ewic.bcs.org/

REFERENCES

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(2018) Blacklists and Redlists: How China's Social Credit System Actually Works TechNode TechNode Available from: technode.com/2018/10/23/china-social-credit
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Floyd E. Dewhirst et al. 2010 The Human Oral Microbiome Journal of Bacteriology, American Society for Microbiology Journals Available from: jb.asm.org/content/192/19/5002
Anthony DunneFiona Raby 2014 Consuming Monsters: Big, Perfect, Infectious Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction and Social Dreaming MIT 47 61
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Lakshmi Iyengar 2016 You Have a Microbial Cloud! Yale Scientific Magazine Yale Scientific Magazine Available from: www.yalescientific.org/2016/02/you-have-a-microbial-cloud/
Juul SøndergaardMarie LouiseLone Koefoed Hansen 2016 PeriodShare: A Blood Design Fiction ACM Digital Library Available from: https://doi.org/10.1145/2971485.2996748
Joseph Lindley et al. 2017 Implications for Adoption ACM Digital Library Available from: doi.org/10.1145/3025453.3025742.
Megan Molteni 2017 Google Is Giving Away AI That Can Build Your Genome Sequence Wired Conde Nast Available from: www.wired.com/story/google-is-giving-away-ai-that-can-build-your-genome-sequence/
W H Moos et al. 2016 Microbiota and Neurological Disorders: A Gut Feeling Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports U.S. National Library of Medicine Available from: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27274912
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Comments

Comment on this article

[1] Alison Abbott 2016 Scientists Bust Myth That Our Bodies Have More Bacteria than Human Cells Nature News Nature Publishing Group Available from: www.nature.com/news/scientists-bust-myth-that-our-bodies-have-more-bacteria-than-human-cells-1.19136

[2] About the Human Microbiome NIH Human Microbiome Project – About the Human Microbiome Available from: hmpdacc.org/hmp/overview/

[3] (2018) Blacklists and Redlists: How China's Social Credit System Actually Works TechNode TechNode Available from: technode.com/2018/10/23/china-social-credit

[4] Erin Brodwin 2018 DNA-Testing Company 23andMe Has Signed a $300 Million Deal with a Drug Giant. Here's How to Delete Your Data If That Freaks You out Business Insider, Business Insider Available from: www.businessinsider.com/dna-testing-delete-your-data-23andme-ancestry-2018-7

[5] E Castro-NallarBendall MLM Pérez-LosadaS SabuncyanSeverance EGDickerson FBSchroeder JRYolken RHCrandall KA 2015 Composition, taxonomy and functional diversity of the oropharynx microbiome in individuals with schizophrenia and controls PeerJ3:e1140 Available from: https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.1140

[6] Megan Clapp et al. 2017 Gut Microbiota’s Effect on Mental Health: The Gut-Brain Axis U.S. National Library of Medicine Available from: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5641835/

[7] Floyd E. Dewhirst et al. 2010 The Human Oral Microbiome Journal of Bacteriology, American Society for Microbiology Journals Available from: jb.asm.org/content/192/19/5002

[8] Anthony DunneFiona Raby 2014 Consuming Monsters: Big, Perfect, Infectious Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction and Social Dreaming MIT 47 61

[9] Behnaz Farahi Caress of the Gaze Behnaz Farahi Available from: behnazfarahi.com/caress-of-the-gaze/

[10] Frost, and Sullivan 2017 Harnessing Microbiome Science for Therapeutic Development The Alliance of Advanced BioMedical Engineering Available from aabme.asme.org/posts/human-microbiomics-harnessing-microbiome-science-for-therapeutic-development

[11] Google Genomics – Store, Process, Explore and Share | Cloud Genomics | Google Cloud Google Google Available from: cloud.google.com/genomics/

[12] Jessica Green 2013 We're Covered in Germs. Let's Design for That TED Ideas Worth Spreading Ted Available from: www.ted.com/talks/jessica_green_good_germs_make_healthy_buildings#t-395191

[13] Lakshmi Iyengar 2016 You Have a Microbial Cloud! Yale Scientific Magazine Yale Scientific Magazine Available from: www.yalescientific.org/2016/02/you-have-a-microbial-cloud/

[14] Juul SøndergaardMarie LouiseLone Koefoed Hansen 2016 PeriodShare: A Blood Design Fiction ACM Digital Library Available from: https://doi.org/10.1145/2971485.2996748

[15] Joseph Lindley et al. 2017 Implications for Adoption ACM Digital Library Available from: doi.org/10.1145/3025453.3025742.

[16] Megan Molteni 2017 Google Is Giving Away AI That Can Build Your Genome Sequence Wired Conde Nast Available from: www.wired.com/story/google-is-giving-away-ai-that-can-build-your-genome-sequence/

[17] W H Moos et al. 2016 Microbiota and Neurological Disorders: A Gut Feeling Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports U.S. National Library of Medicine Available from: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27274912

[18] Neri Oxman Living Mushtari – MIT Media Lab MIT Media Lab Mediated Matter Group Available from www.media.mit.edu/projects/living-mushtari/overview/

[19] Soares Susana Bee's Project Susana Soares Available from: www.susanasoares.com/index.php?id=56

[20] Giulia Tomasello Future Flora Is a Harvesting Kit Designed for Women to Treat and Prevent Vaginal Infections Giulia Tomasello Available from gitomasello.com/Future-Flora

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