2022, Volume 18
Cyborgization in sport – a problem on the borderline of interfering with the athlete's body, ethical and pedagogical challenges
Adam Podolski1, Kinga Kania1
1Institute of Pedagogy, College of Social Sciences, University of Rzeszow, Rzeszow, Poland
Author for correspondence: Adam Podolski; Institute of Pedagogy, College of Social Sciences, University of Rzeszow, Rzeszow, Poland; email: apodolsk@ur.edu.pl
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Abstract
Sport is an activity that permanently extends the bounds of its functioning and this area is susceptible to the expansion of technical innovations. This kind of alliance of technology with the world of sport can be considered in several respects. It can be regarded as a technology that improves comfort of sports competition, training technology, technology that affects the attractiveness of a sports event (marketing aspect), the use of advanced technology to conduct sports competition. However, there is a special aspect – technological interference with the sportsperson's body. The aim of this scientific essay is our view on ethical and pedagogical issues related to the phenomenon of modern technology interfering with the body of a disabled person who undertakes a professional sports activity (including combat sports).
Manfred Clynes & Nathan Kline used the term "cyborg" in a paper from 1960 delivered during a NASA conference on space exploration as a combination of "cybernetics" and "organism" – they did not limit it to a combination of synthetic and organic parts. A few years later, these authors presented the cyborg as an achievement of a specific transhuman goal: a human being freed from the mechanical constraints of his/her body. This concept also refers to sports, including disabled sports. Sports activity of disabled people is defined as a form of their participation in physical culture, the main purpose of which is to maintain and develop functional efficiency regained in the process of medical rehabilitation. However, the temptation is great – the negative phenomena of professional sport are transferred to various areas of disabled sports.
In the ancient sport, the Olympic idea was destroyed by professionalism, in modern sport doping is a danger, and the threat to professional sport of the 21st century may be technological progress and transhuman ideas. These phenomena are the minor contribution to violate ethics in sport and create multi-faceted legislative and intra-organisational risks for entities working in the field of sports promotion.
Key words: combat sports, disabled sports, science of martial arts, transhuman