Part Six. The final episode in this series looks forward into the future. If we are able to reach the point where we can create advanced AI ‘beings’, will we be able to live alongside them – especially if they are in some ways more intelligent than us, or hold our lives in their hands? Thanks to Philip Ball for original music and www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects under creative commons Attribution 3.0 license

Part Five. IBM is one of the world’s biggest makers of “thinking machines” – computers. Would a cyborg be more successful, for example, than a being made entirely from human parts? Phil speaks to David Cox of IBM, an expert in the intersection between machine intelligence and neuroscience. Thanks to Philip Ball for original music and www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects under creative commons Attribution 3.0 license

Part Four. Phil goes to Harvard University to speak to eminent psychologist Tomer Ullman about how humans think and to ask if (and how) we could teach an artificial mind to learn what it needs to become ‘sentient’ and behave like a human. Thanks to Philip Ball for original music and www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects under creative commons Attribution 3.0 license.

Part Three. The essence of humanity is often considered to lie in the human mind. If we could grow a brain to put into an artificial being, would that make it human? Will it have a mind at all? Phil talks to Alan Jasanoff of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) about the difficulties of understanding what the brain – and the mind – actually are. Thanks to Philip Ball for original music and www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects under creative commons Attribution 3.0 license.

Part Two. Stealing organs, as Victor Frankenstein did, is one way of going about things, but perhaps it’s safer and more legal to grow them instead… Phil’s quest takes him to speak to Robert Langer of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) about the advances in human organ growth and asks him about the generation and regeneration of our body’s tissues and parts. Thanks to Philip Ball for original music and www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects

Part One. So how to start building our an artificial human? Start small with the human genome. Phil goes to Harvard Medical School to track down eminent gene editor George Church and finds out about how this technology could be opening up ways of creating not only humans, but actual superhumans’.   Music by Philip Ball Thanks to www.Freesound.org for supplying sound effects under creative commons Attribution 3.0 license created by the following artists; Dobroide, Daveincamas, Decembered,...