The Review That Won't End Is, for the Augmented, the Whole Point

GENEVA — The international safety review of neural-interface augmentation has been open and contested all year, and for the roughly five percent of humanity now augmented, that unresolved status is not a footnote — it is the condition of their lives. The review has neither cleared the technology nor condemned it; it simply continues, which means every augmented worker, patient and volunteer lives inside a question the authorities have not answered. Somaform Augmetics founder Julian Morrow calls the open review "responsible caution"; his critics call it an alibi. Caught between them is someone like Priya Nair, a logistics worker in Geneva whose neural interface lets her hold a warehouse's whole flow in her head. "They debate whether it is safe," she said. "I go to work with it every morning. The debate does not clock in for my shift." She is not asking the review to hurry — she has read enough to want it careful. She is asking only that the people arguing about her remember she is not a hypothesis. The review will run on. So, meanwhile, will she.