title: Doug Ford

text: Polling results ahead of the leadership ballot were mixed. A February Ipsos/Global News poll found that Ford had the most support of all the PC leadership candidates in Toronto and would beat the Liberals in the city by nine points, but a Mainstreet poll showed him doing only marginally better than the other PC candidates except Patrick Brown, and a Forum Research poll suggested he would have less support than the other candidates.


title: Doug Ford

text: On March 10, Ford won the PC leadership on the third ballot. The results were too close to call and there was a dispute over whether some votes were allocated to the correct electoral districts, so the announcement was not be made at the originally scheduled convention. A news conference was held later that night after a recount was completed. Elliott conceded the next day and endorsed Ford as leader.


title: Doug Ford

text: In March 2018, the Liberals tabled a pre-election budget in the provincial legislature which promised billions of dollars in new spending for free childcare and expanded coverage for dental care but replaced the government's previous balanced budget with a $6.7 billion deficit projected to last until 2024–2025. Ford called the budget a "spending spree". He said he would condense the Conservative platform adopted under former leader Patrick Brown, reducing "about ten percent of [it]", into a five-point plan focusing on health, education, creating jobs, getting rid of the province's cap and trade program for carbon emissions, and reducing electricity rates.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford was critical of the sex education components of the Ontario health curriculum which was updated in 2015, and stated that he believed it needed to be reviewed. He suggested that minors should be required to consult their parents before obtaining an abortion, and indicated he would allow the introduction of a private member's bill requiring parental consent. Liberal campaign co-chair Deb Matthews accused Ford of wading into "divisive social conservative issues" with his remarks.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford said he would revive manufacturing in Ontario by easing regulations, cutting taxes, and ensuring competitive electricity rates. Ford criticized the Liberal government for not proceeding quickly enough to develop the Northern Ontario Ring of Fire, saying that he'd get on a bulldozer himself if necessary. Northern Ontario newspaper "The Chronicle-Journal" criticized Ford's remarks as being "simplistic" in regards to Indigenous land claims and ensuring Indigenous communities receive a share of any economic gains.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford announced at an April 3 rally in Hamilton, Ontario, that if elected his government would allow Hamilton City Council to reallocate the $1.3 billion allocated for the city's proposed rapid transit system to roads or other infrastructure. Hamilton mayor Fred Eisenberger responded saying that city council had already decided the issue and that cancelling the LRT would mean $100 million would "be thrown away". Ted McMeekin, a local Liberal MPP, criticized Ford's announcement saying "He paints himself as a responsible fiscal person but sees nothing wrong with writing a blank cheque for $1.2 billion."


title: Doug Ford

text: In early April, the CBC published their analysis of aggregate polls showing that Ford and the Progressive Conservatives were ahead of the other parties averaging 42.1 percent support, compared to 27.2 percent for the governing Liberals, 23.4 percent for the NDP and 5.7 percent for the Greens and with 11 Liberal MPPs announcing they would not be running for re-election or having already resigned their seats in the months leading up to the election.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford and the PC Party received the endorsement of former Toronto mayor Mel Lastman and former Mississauga mayor Hazel McCallion. In explaining her choice not to support Kathleen Wynne's Liberals, McCallion said "As mayor, I never ran the city based on debt. I know the real Doug Ford. He's hardworking, he cares about people of all ages and can be trusted." In the media, Ford was compared to U.S. President Donald Trump. "The Guardian" described Ford as a "businessman turned anti-establishment politician", a "son of a wealthy entrepreneur" who "rails against elites" and "often shuns expertise", while noting a sharp difference with Trump by pointing out that during his 2014 Toronto mayoral campaign "Ford drummed up strong support among some of the city’s most diverse neighbourhoods, suggesting his populist touch resonates with immigrants and racialized minorities who have traditionally self-identified as disenfranchised". Ford rejected the comparisons while praising some of Trump's policies.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford led the PC Party to a majority government in the general election held on June 7, 2018, taking 76 of 124 seats in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, including his own riding of Etobicoke North. Ford had been PC leader for less than 100 days when his party won the election.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford was sworn in as premier on June 29, 2018, incorporating a ceremony outdoors on the lawn of Queen's Park. Ford is the first newly elected MPP to take office as premier since Mitch Hepburn did so in 1934.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford is a fiscal conservative. He supports across-the-board tax reductions at all three levels of government. As a Toronto city councilor and mayoral candidate, Ford supported eliminating the car registration tax, eliminating the land transfer tax and keeping property tax increases below the rate of inflation, and as leader of the Ontario PC Party and the premier, Ford promised to reduce provincial taxes. His proposals included eliminating cap and trade, eliminating the provincial income tax for minimum wage workers, reducing middle-class income tax rates, reducing the corporate income tax, reducing the small business tax and reducing the gasoline tax.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford believes in reducing overall government spending. Ford proposed reducing government spending enough to pay for his proposed tax cuts and to balance the budget. He pledged to introduce a moratorium on wind and solar projects and to cancel subsidies for electric cars. He also promised to end the practice of giving subsidies and grants to businesses on a case-by-case basis and to cancel the Jobs and Prosperity Fund. Ford's government cancelled the basic income pilot project. He opposes the laying off of government workers. He supports the use of attrition to eliminate government jobs that he believes are not needed. Ford believes in hiring independent auditors to audit government spending.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford opposes deficit spending and the accumulation of debt. He has criticized provincial governments for accumulating debt and for spending money on interest payments. Ford promised to balance the budget within his first term as premier.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford campaigned on "buck-a-beer" and reduced the minimum price of beer from $1.25 to $1. The program saw low adoption by breweries and resellers. As a result of lowering the price floor, a regulation that capped annual increases in pricing that was tied to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was also eliminated and is projected to result in increased prices overall.


title: Doug Ford

text: On November 15, 2018, Finance Minister Vic Fedeli tabled the 2018 Ontario Economic Outlook which included a tax cut representing as much as $850 a year for individuals and $1,700 for couples. LIFT would mean that a single person working full-time in minimum wage job, would pay no provincial personal income tax. Minimum wage workers would still pay federal income tax which represents 75 percent of the tax rate. LIFT is a variation on Ford's promise to cut taxes on those making less than $30,000 a year. The amount of the tax credit applies only to minimum wage earners with full-time jobs. An individual who works part-time at $20 an hour but only earns $20,000 a year, would not be eligible. Economist Sheila Block said that a $15 minimum wage would represent about $1,100 more a year for low income earners than Ford's tax credit. In September 2018, Ford's government froze the minimum wage at $14 per hour and cancelled a planned increase.


title: Doug Ford

text: On June 15, 2018, then premier-designate, Ford announced in a statement that one of the first actions of his newly formed cabinet would be to eliminate the province's cap and trade program under the 2016 "Climate Change Mitigation and Low-Carbon Economy Act", a polluter pay bill that "generated funds for climate change mitigation and adaptation," put in place by the Liberal government. As premier, through the "Cap and Trade Cancellation Act, 2018" which was tabled on July 25, 2018, Ford repealed cap and trade as part of his promise to lower gasoline prices by 10 cents per litre. A court later ruled that as Ontario's "Environmental Bill of Rights" required the government hold public consultations before removing the program, the government's unilateral decision broke the law. As federal law requires provinces to have in place their own pollution pricing system, as a result of Ontario withdrawing from the Western Climate Initiative, a carbon tax was automatically imposed on the province.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford had warned that the imposition of the federal carbon tax would result in an increase in the price of gas in Ontario. According to fuel price analyst Patrick DeHaan, the average retail price of gas increased from 114.3 cents per litre before the carbon tax to "117.9 cents on April 1, the first day of the new tax" and 125.3 cents per litre in mid-July. There has been a 9.2 per cent drop in gasoline prices across Canada over the last year, according to the July 17, 2019 Statistics Canada report which resulted in inflation falling nationally in June 2019 to 2.0 per cent. DeHaan said that in July 2018 the average price of gas in Ontario had been 130.1 cents per litre. He added that the retail price of gas reflects the drop in the price of oil prices from US$72 per barrel to US$60 a barrel in 2019 and is not related to the carbon tax. As a result, rebates for electric vehicles funded through the program were cancelled, and a program known as the Green Ontario Fund, which was financed by the proceeds of cap-and-trade auctions and aimed to help homeowners reduce their carbon footprint and reduce hydro bills, was eliminated.


title: Doug Ford

text: In July, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that provinces that do not adopt a carbon pricing mechanism by September 1, 2018, would be subject to a federal carbon tax of $20/tonne starting in January 2019. Ontario's "fiscal watchdog" and other analysts said that the province will have to refund an estimated $3 billion in carbon credits over four years purchased under the cap and trade program. By mid-November 2018, "The Globe and Mail" reported that the Ontario government had "lost $2.7-billion in revenue" which included the $1.5-billion loss of revenue from the elimination of the cap-and-trade program.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford has worked with the premiers of Saskatchewan, Manitoba and New Brunswick to fight the federal government's carbon tax legislation, and has also supported campaigns to repeal the carbon tax led by federal Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer and Alberta United Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney. Ford believes the federal "Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act", which imposes a carbon tax on provinces that do not have their own pollution pricing regime is unconstitutional. He committed $30 million to challenge the federal legislation, $4 million of which was spent on anti-carbon pricing advertisements including printing anti-carbon pricing stickers and imposing fines for gas station owners failing to display the stickers. The province mandating the display of the stickers was later ruled to be itself unconstitutional, in violation of section 2(b) of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms", which guarantees business owners' freedom of expression.


title: Doug Ford

text: The Supreme Court of Canada later ruled that the constitution allows for the federal government to introduce pollution pricing on behalf of provinces who do not have their own regime.


title: Doug Ford

text: In 2018, Ford expressed support for publicly funded healthcare and a belief that funding should be increased to create 30,000 additional long-term care beds. In 2020, Ford's government spent $3.5 billion less on health care than budgeted.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford believes that the provincial government should fully subsidize dental costs for low-income seniors.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford has been accused of attempting to privatize healthcare in the province of Ontario. In August 2022, Ford suggested additional private deliveries of healthcare in order to supplement existing public healthcare in response to a hospital staff shortage throughout Ontario.


title: Doug Ford

text: The Ford government introduced the Ontario Health agency in 2019, with the goal of centralizing services. The province expects to save $350 million a year by 2021–22.


title: Doug Ford

text: The introduction of the agency has been criticized however, as similar approach was introduced in Alberta, which has the highest per capita healthcare spending in the country, with the NDP noting that "In British Columbia and in Alberta, health centralization wasted billions of dollars", and as wasting "time, money and energy on reshaping the health bureaucracy" rather than "specific solutions to well-identified problems."


title: Doug Ford

text: Immediately after taking office in 2018, Ford proposed to cut 3,475 Ontario teaching jobs over four years to save $292 million a year, Ford also cancelled the Green Ontario Fund residential rebate program which included a $100 million fund for public school repair, free prescriptions to youth 24 and under, and an initiative to add indigenous peoples content to school curriculum, and eliminated free tuition for low-income students (while reducing tuition fees by 10 per cent),


title: Doug Ford

text: On July 11, 2018, Ford announced that Ontario's health curriculum including sexual education components, updated by the previous government in 2015, would be reverted to the 1998 curriculum before the next school year. He pledged to create a new sex-education curriculum after consulting with parents and teachers. Ford stated the sex-education curriculum needed to be changed because it was not age-appropriate and not based on enough consultation. He also opposes teaching students about non-binary genders.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford believes that financial literacy education should be expanded and included in school curricula, and believes Ontario's math curriculum should drop discovery learning and put a greater emphasis on arithmetic and memorization of the multiplication table.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford used back-to-work legislation to end the 2018 strike at York University prior to the start of the 2018–2019 school year. The strike had gone on for over four months, making it the longest post-secondary strike in Canadian history. Ford ordered all public universities and colleges in Ontario to develop free-speech policies that meet his government's expectations and stated that universities and colleges that do not comply will face funding reductions.


title: Doug Ford

text: By June 2019, the Ford government had removed or decreased funding for "school programs like after-school jobs for youth in low-income neighbourhoods", "tutors in classrooms", "daily physical activity for elementary students", "financial assistance for college and university students", "free tuition for low-income students", and "three satellite university campuses". He also "increased class sizes" and "cancelled three summer curriculum-writing sessions—one mandated by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and two others.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford's government introduced Bill 28, known as the "Keeping Students in Class Act", which was passed by the Legislative Assembly of Ontario on November 3, 2022, amid ongoing labour negotiations with the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE). CUPE had given notice of job action October 30 after negotiations broke down with the Ministry of Education, and would have been in a legal strike position on November 4. Bill 28 imposes a contract on CUPE, and makes it illegal to strike, setting fines of $4000 for workers.


title: Doug Ford

text: The bill invokes the notwithstanding clause, shielding it from being struck down by the courts by allowing the bill to operate despite the right to collective bargaining granted by the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms". The legislation was widely condemned, including by opposition parties, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada David Lametti, the Ontario Bar Association, and other unions including those which had previously endorsed the PC Party.


title: Doug Ford

text: Despite the government's bill, CUPE went on strike anyway, resulting in province-wide school closures and protests in support of education workers. The government challenged CUPE at the Ontario Labour Relations Board. On November 7, 2022, Ford announced that he would rescind Bill 28 and that he would resume negotiations with CUPE. Following the strike, Ford said he did not regret his use of the notwithstanding clause in imposing the contract and said that it helped both sides "come to their senses".


title: Doug Ford

text: Prior to his election as premier, Ford was a Toronto city councillor during the tenure of his brother, Rob Ford, as mayor of Toronto. In 2014, Doug took over this brother's mayoral campaign, running against Olivia Chow and eventual winner John Tory.


title: Doug Ford

text: Provincially, Ford's riding as a member of Provincial Parliament is in the Toronto suburb of Etobicoke.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford believes that the constitution does not prevent provincial governments from changing the size of municipal councils, even after an election campaign has already begun. After his government's legislation to reduce the number of wards represented at Toronto City Council was ruled unconstitutional, Ford pledged to invoke section 33's notwithstanding clause of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms" which would allow him to bypass the "Charter" and implement the legislation regardless of the court's ruling. The Ontario Court of Appeal later ruled in Ford's favour and allowed his modification to the council. The matter was further appealed by the City of Toronto and is now under consideration by the Supreme Court.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford is proponent of subways. He believed that the provincial government should assume control over the Toronto subway. In February 2020, Ford and Toronto Mayor John Tory signed a preliminary agreement which would see the province assume "sole responsibility for the planning, design and construction" for Ontario Line, the three-stop Line 2 subway extension into Scarborough, the Yonge North subway extension and the Eglinton Crosstown west extension. In 2020, construction began on the Hurontario LRT line in Mississauga and Brampton.


title: Doug Ford

text: In 2019, the government announced that it would adjust the cost-sharing arrangement for Toronto Public Health and Toronto Paramedic Services resulting in retroactive cuts that would total $177 million a year and $1 billion cut in Toronto over 10 years. The cuts were criticized by City officials including Medical Officer of Health Dr. Eileen de Villa, Health board chair Joe Cressy, and Mayor John Tory. The City projected that the additional financial pressure resulting from would result in further cuts to municipal services or increased taxes. Amidst backlash, Ford announced that the province would keep the cost-sharing arrangement and re-evaluate it at the end of the fiscal year.


title: Doug Ford

text: On December 6, 2018, the Ford government tabled its omnibus bill, Bill 66. The bill allows municipalities to request a provincial government override of any regulations that currently deter businesses from locating in the region. Ford's political opponents and groups that promote environmental protection raised concerns that the "opaque", "vague language" in Bill 66 could mean clean water regulations and other bylaws that protect environmentally sensitive land could be bypassed. According to a December 7 "Globe and Mail" article, under Bill 66, municipalities would only be required to obtain permission from the minister of municipal affairs, to override sections of the 2006 "Clean Water Act", the 2015 "Great Lakes Protection Act", the 2006 "Lake Simcoe Protection Act", and the 2005 "Greenbelt Act".


title: Doug Ford

text: During his election campaign Ford had promised to lower Ontario's electricity rates by 12 percent. During his campaign, in April 2018, he announced that in order to reduce electricity rates, he would redirect the province's dividends from partial ownership of Hydro One to subsidize market electricity rates, as well as absorbing the cost of conservation programs currently paid for by consumers, at an estimated cost of $800 million per year.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford attacked Hydro One CEO Mayo Schmidt, calling him "Kathleen Wynne's $6-million dollar man" in reference to his reported annual salary, and called on the utility's board of directors to resign. Ford vowed to fire them all if elected, although PC energy critic Todd Smith later clarified that the government cannot dismiss Hydro One's CEO directly. He opposed his predecessor's decision to privatize Hydro One, but does not plan to reverse the decision. His government passed legislation to publicly disclose and reduce the salaries of Hydro One's board members and executives. On July 11, 2018, Hydro One CEO Mayo Schmidt resigned along with the entire board.


title: Doug Ford

text: According to "Bloomberg News", by December 5, 2018, Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, the state's regulators, rejected Hydro One's $3.4 Billion takeover of Avista because of "political risks in Ontario ... from provincial leaders who may not have the company’s well being in mind". Bloomberg also reported that, if the merger was not approved by the state's regulators, Hydro One would have to pay CA$138 million break fee. Because Hydro One is partially owned by the Ontario government, Ontario ratepayers would also be paying the "Parent Termination Fee". Ford denies that he is to blame for the U.S. regulators' decision.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford came under fire in December 2018 by Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Deputy Commissioner Brad Blair, who claimed Ford requested the OPP “purchase a large camper-type vehicle ... modified to specifications the premier’s office would provide” and keep the costs “off the books.” The vehicle was intended for the premier to use for work, and reportedly was asked to include a swivel chair. The accusation followed on the heels of Ford appointing a longtime family friend to be the next OPP commissioner just days after lowering the requirements for the position.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford supports allowing licensed private retailers to sell cannabis, rather than a government monopoly like the LCBO.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford opposed the legalization of recreational cannabis. On January 22, 2019, "Huffington Post" reported that Ford's youngest daughter Kyla, a bodybuilder and fitness trainer, had posted videos promoting health benefits of CBD oil, a cannabis product which typically does not contain the psychoactive compound present in marijuana. Various publications claimed Kyla's promotion wasn't lawful. Ford's daughter took down the posts, but neither Ford nor his daughter commented on them.


title: Doug Ford

text: In July 2018, Ford hired Rueben Devlin, former PC Party president and a Ford family friend, as a health-care advisor at a salary of $350,000 plus expenses, more than Ford's own salary of $208,974.


title: Doug Ford

text: In December 2018 Bob Paulson, who served as a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) officer for 32-years including as RCMP commissioner before retiring in 2017, called for an independent third-party inquiry into Ford's appointment in December 2018 of Toronto Police Superintendent Ron Taverner, who is a long-time friend of Ford, as the new commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police. By March 2019, Taverner had stepped down following "months of controversy" that "triggered an integrity commissioner investigation".


title: Doug Ford

text: A June 20, 2019, article in the "Toronto Star" said that Ford had awarded "plum patronage posts to two political allies". He hired Jag Badwal as Ontario's agent-general to Britain and the United States with an annual salary of $185,000. Ford named Earl Provost as Ontario's agent-general to Chicago.


title: Doug Ford

text: On June 28, 2019, Ford's chief of staff, Dean French, resigned "amid a patronage scandal". According to a "Globe and Mail" article, French resigned "after it was revealed that two people with personal ties to [French], 26 year-old Tyler Albrecht and Taylor Shields were appointed to lucrative positions in New York and London. The "Toronto Sun" reported in a June 27, 2019, article that 26-year-old Tyler Albrecht, who had a "thin resume", was proposed for a "job that paid $165,000 a year, plus housing and other expenses" as Ontario's "new trade rep in New York City". His qualification was "that he played lacrosse with French's son". TVO's Steve Paikin cited the example of Taylor Shields, who is French's wife's cousin, who was appointed as the trade representative in London, England, with a salary of $185,000 plus expenses. Just hours before French resigned, Ford had cancelled Albrecht's and Shields' appointments.


title: Doug Ford

text: Thomas Staples, who played on St. Michael's College Varsity Lacrosse team with French as coach, worked in the office of Bill Walker, who was chief government whip. When Walker became minister of government and consumer services in November 2018, Staples worked as his executive assistant and legislative affairs advisor. According to "iPolitics", Staples had not completed his undergraduate studies, and had neither the qualifications nor work experience in politics.


title: Doug Ford

text: French's niece, Katherine Pal, who had been appointed as Ontario's Public Accounts Council resigned after her family ties to French were revealed. According to Paikin, Pal was well qualified to be Public Accounts Council but she resigned because of the bad optics.


title: Doug Ford

text: On July 4, Peter Fenwick, who served as Ontario's first "strategic transformation adviser" since November 2018, was fired when it was revealed in an interview with "The Star" that "Fenwick has been a life insurance customer of French's for at least 20 years".


title: Doug Ford

text: On July 10, Andrew Suboch, a "a personal injury and insurance lawyer" who had served as chair of the Justices of the Peace Appointments Advisory Committee (JPAAC), informed the JPAAC that he was resigning immediately after an article in the "Globe" revealed that Suboch was another of French's "long-time" friends whose sons played lacrosse together for many years.


title: Doug Ford

text: According to a July 4, 2019, article in the "Toronto Star", John Fraser, interim Ontario Liberal leader, called for a "formal probe" into French's "involvement in appointments" to be undertaken by J. David Wake—Ontario's integrity commissioner—in order "to clear the air and restore public confidence". He asked that Ford "make any findings public" because of the "tremendous influence" French had in Ford's government.


title: Doug Ford

text: In December 2019, an outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was first identified in Wuhan, Hubei, China; it spread worldwide and was recognized as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11, 2020. The first confirmed case in Canada was in Ontario—reported on January 27, 2020.


title: Doug Ford

text: On March 17, Ford declared a state of emergency in Ontario, closing bars and restaurants (with the exception of take-out and delivery services), as well as libraries, theatres, cinemas, schools and daycares and all public gatherings of more than 50 people (later reduced to 5 people on March 28). Furthermore, the government announced on March 17 that Ontario had "some evidence of community transmission" of COVID-19.


title: Doug Ford

text: On March 23, Ford announced that all "non-essential" businesses be ordered closed starting 11:59 p.m. On March 24. Ford also stated that schools would remain closed past the original April 6 opening date (on May 19 it was announced that schools would remain closed until the following school year in September). A list of 74 "essential" businesses was published later in the day on March 23.


title: Doug Ford

text: On March 25, Ford and Finance Minister Rod Phillips introduced a $17-billion response package that includes an influx of cash for the health sector, direct payments to parents and tax breaks for businesses.


title: Doug Ford

text: On April 9, 2021, Ford received his first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine at a local pharmacy in Toronto, and encouraged eligible Ontarians to get vaccinated.


title: Doug Ford

text: Amid growing case numbers in mid-2021, the government moved to introduce a third province-wide stay at home order. As part of the response, Ford announced on April 16, 2021, that outdoor amenities including playgrounds would be closed, and that he would be authorizing police to require pedestrians and drivers to explain why they are not at home and provide their home address and other relevant details. The regulations raised concerns about a re-legalization of carding. The government experienced significant backlash with the new enforcement measures, with some commentators – such as the "National Post"'s Randall Denley, a former PC politician – equating the province to a "police state" Members of the Ontario COVID-19 Science Table described the new restrictions as "absolute madness", and not based on science questioning the need to restrict "safe options from people as you do nothing to impact the places where the disease is spreading". After dozens of police services across the province announced that they would refuse to enforce the new measures, Ford promptly rolled back the new enforcement provisions the next day and reopened playgrounds, while keeping other outdoor amenities closed.


title: Doug Ford

text: Over the weekend following the introduction of new orders, calls for Ford's resignation over his handling of the COVID-19 crisis grew, In April 2021, Ford revealed that he had been in isolation following contact with one of his staffers, who had contracted COVID-19. Ford announced on April 30, 2021, that he had asked the federal government to stop international students from coming into the province in an effort to curb the third wave.


title: Doug Ford

text: During the emergence of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 in December 2021 and January 2022, Ford's government announced in December 2021 new restrictions on indoor settings. After growing calls for third or booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines, the government allowed all Ontarians over 18 years of age to receive a third dose on December 20, 2021.


title: Doug Ford

text: On January 3, 2022, Ford announced that Ontario would be moving into modified Step 2 on January 5, closing indoor dining, gyms, movie theatres and schools.


title: Doug Ford

text: Mandate letters requested by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation through a freedom of information request were not released to the public, despite being ordered to by the Ontario information and privacy commissioner in 2019. The final appeal of the decision is now being sent to the Supreme Court of Canada.


title: Doug Ford

text: In March 2021, Ford publicly accused MPP Sol Mamakwa of "jumping the line" to receive his second dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, despite being eligible to receive it. Mamakwa went to his riding to receive the vaccine as an attempt to prevent vaccine hesitancy amongst his constituents. On Thursday, 11 March 2021, Ford apologised for his remark and later said he "got a little personal" when throwing the accusation at Mamakwa. Mamakwa did not say that he accepted Ford's apology but stated that he appreciated the call from Ford.


title: Doug Ford

text: In September 2021, an Ontario judge issued an injunction on mining in Wiisinin Zaahgi'igan (an area sacred to the Ginoogaming First Nation peoples). The judge ruled that the Ontario government did not consult with the Ginoogaming as is their constitutional duty.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford actively supported the two Toronto mayoral campaigns of his brother Rob Ford. In federal politics, Ford supports the Conservative Party of Canada and several provincial conservative parties, including the Alberta United Conservative Party.


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford endorsed the economic policies of the Republican Party and the presidency of Donald Trump in the United States, saying his support for Trump is "unwavering". After Trump announced tariffs on Canadian aluminum imports in August 2020, Ford expressed his disapproval, calling Trump's policy "totally unacceptable".


title: Doug Ford

text: In 2018, Rob's widow sued Doug and Randy for mismanagement of Rob's estate, saying their actions deprived her and her children of due compensation while overseeing business losses at Deco Labels totalling half of the company's market value. In response, Doug alleged that the claims and the lawsuit's timing in the same week as the 2018 Ontario election amounted to extortion.


title: Doug Ford

text: Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ford's daughter Krista has controversially engaged in the spread of COVID-19 misinformation and conspiracy theories. In December 2021, Krista and her husband participated in "The Christian Fight for Freedom", a panel discussion which included discussions that were anti-vaccine and anti-mask in nature. The event was advertised as having special guests "Dave and Krista Haynes, family of the premier Doug Ford".


title: Doug Ford

text: Ford became an "ethical vegetarian" after working in a meatpacking plant as a teenager, and while this is no longer the case, he still does not eat red meat. Ford, who is obese, has struggled with his weight at least since 2012, when he publicly attempted a weight loss challenge. Ford is occasionally fat shamed in the media, having been previously called "unfashionably overweight".


title: Doug Ford

text: In 2014, Doug and his mother donated $90,000 to Humber River Hospital, where Rob Ford was receiving care. Upon Rob's death, Doug and Randy took on stewardship of Rob's share of Deco Labels and Tags.


title: Shriners

text: Shriners International, formerly known as the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine (AAONMS), is an American Masonic society established in 1870 and is headquartered in Tampa, Florida.


title: Shriners

text: Shriners International describes itself as a fraternity based on fun, fellowship, and the Masonic principles of brotherly love, relief, and truth. There are approximately 350,000 members from 196 temples (chapters) in the US, Canada, Brazil, Bolivia, Mexico, Panama, the Philippines, Europe, and Australia. The organization is best known for the Shriners Hospitals for Children that it administers, and the red fezzes that members wear.


title: Shriners

text: The organization was previously known as "Shriners North America". The name was changed in 2010 across North America, Central America, South America, Europe, and Southeast Asia.


title: Shriners

text: In 1870, there were several thousand Freemasons in Manhattan, many of whom lunched at the Knickerbocker Cottage at a special table on the second floor. There, the idea of a new fraternity for Masons, stressing fun and fellowship, was discussed. Together, Walter M. Fleming and William J. Florence established a separate fellowship to fulfill those ideals.


title: Shriners

text: Florence, an actor, while on tour in Marseille, was invited to a party given by an Arab diplomat. The entertainment was something in the nature of an elaborately staged musical comedy. At its conclusion, the guests became members of a secret society. Florence took copious notes and drawings at his initial viewing and on two other occasions, once in Algiers and once in Cairo. When he returned to New York in 1870, he showed his material to Fleming.


title: Shriners

text: Fleming created the ritual, emblem and costumes. Florence and Fleming were initiated August 13, 1870, and they initiated 11 other men on June 16, 1871.


title: Shriners

text: The group adopted a Middle Eastern theme and soon established Temples (though the term Temple has now generally been replaced by Shrine Auditorium or Shrine Center). The first Temple established was Mecca Temple (now known as Mecca Shriners), established at the New York City Masonic Hall on September 26, 1872. Fleming was the first Potentate.


title: Shriners

text: In 1875, there were only 43 Shriners in the organization. In an effort to encourage membership, at the June 6, 1876 meeting of Mecca Temple, the Imperial Grand Council of the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine for North America was created. Fleming was elected the first Imperial Potentate. After some other reworking, by 1878 there were 425 members in 13 temples in eight states, and by 1888, there were 7,210 members in 48 temples in the United States and Canada. By the Imperial Session held in Washington, D.C. in 1900, there were 55,000 members and 82 Temples.


title: Shriners

text: By 1938 there were about 340,000 members in the United States. That year "Life" published photographs of its rites for the first time. It described the Shriners as "among secret lodges the No. 1 in prestige, wealth and show", and stated that "in the typical city, especially in the Middle West, the Shriners will include most of the prominent citizens."


title: Shriners

text: Shriners often participate in local parades, sometimes as rather elaborate units: miniature vehicles in themes (all sports cars; all miniature 18-wheeler trucks; all fire engines, and so on), an "Oriental Band" dressed in cartoonish versions of Middle Eastern dress; pipe bands, drummers, motorcycle units, Drum and Bugle Corps, and traditional brass bands.


title: Shriners

text: Until 2000, before being eligible for membership in the Shrine, a Mason had to complete either the Scottish Rite or York Rite systems, but now any Master Mason can join.


title: Shriners

text: In the past, Shriners have practiced hazing rituals as a part of initiating new members: in 1991, a would-be Shriner sued the Oleika Shrine Temple of Lexington, Kentucky over injuries suffered during the hazing, which included being blindfolded and having a jolt of electricity applied to his bare buttocks. The jury rejected the lawsuit.


title: Shriners

text: There are two organizations tied to the Shrine that are for women only: The Ladies' Oriental Shrine and the Daughters of the Nile. They both support the Shriners Hospitals and promote sociability, and membership in either organization is open to any woman 18 years of age and older who is related to a Shriner or Master Mason by birth or marriage.


title: Shriners

text: The Ladies Oriental Shrine of North America was founded in 1903 in Wheeling, West Virginia, and the Daughters of the Nile was founded in 1913 in Seattle, Washington. The latter organization has local branches called "Temples", and there were ten of these in 1922. Among the famous members of the Daughters of the Nile was First Lady Florence Harding, wife of Warren G. Harding.


title: Shriners

text: In 1893, a black counterpart to the Shriners movement was initiated by John G. Jones and other Prince Hall masons, initially called The Ancient Egyptian Arabic Order Nobles Mystic Shrine of North and South America and Its Jurisdictions. Early in the group's history, there was legal conflict between the white and black orders, with a white order from Texas filing suit against a local black order for infringement of white Shriners regalia and traditions. The white order was initially successful in quashing the black temple until the ruling was overturned in appeals in 1929, protecting the right of black Shriners to continue practicing and fundraising nationwide. The Worldwide Fraternal Shrine Family counts 35,000 members in 227 shrines, with its own women's auxiliary organizations. Their primary recipients of charitable donations are the NAACP, The Urban League, the UNCF, and various hospitals and universities.


title: Shriners

text: Some of the earliest Shrine Centers often chose a Moorish Revival style for their Temples. Architecturally notable Shriners Temples include: the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles; the former Mecca Temple, now called New York City Center and used primarily as a concert hall; Newark Symphony Hall; the Landmark Theater (formerly The Mosque) in Richmond, Virginia; the Tripoli Shrine Temple in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; the Polly Rosenbaum Building (formerly the El Zaribah Shrine Auditorium) in Phoenix; the Helena Civic Center (Montana) (formerly the Algeria Shrine Temple); Abou Ben Adhem Shrine Mosque in Springfield, Missouri; Murat Shrine Temple (now Old National Center) in Indianapolis; the Fox Theatre (Atlanta, Georgia) which was jointly built between the Atlanta Shriners and movie mogul William Fox; and the Syria Mosque, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.


title: Shriners

text: The Shriners controlled an $8 billion endowment as of 2008. A 2008 report included accusation of various financial improprieties in the organization, including not reporting certain benefits they received as income and knowingly filing incorrect tax forms for the hospitals. Other Shriners came forward with other complaints, including the mixing of charitable and noncharitable assets and the disappearance of money raised for the hospitals.


title: Shriners

text: The Shrine's charitable arm is the Shriners Hospitals for Children, a network of 22 healthcare facilities in the United States, Mexico, and Canada.


title: Shriners

text: In June 1920, the Imperial Council Session voted to establish a “Shriners Hospital for Crippled Children”. The purpose of this hospital was to treat orthopedic injuries and conditions, diseases, burns, spinal cord injuries, and birth defects, such as cleft lip and palate, in children. After much research and debate, the committee chosen to determine the site of the hospital decided there should be a network of hospitals across North America. The first hospital opened in 1922 in Shreveport, Louisiana. By the end of the decade 13 more hospitals were operational. Shriners Hospitals now provide orthopedic care, burn treatment, cleft lip and palate care and spinal cord injury rehabilitation.


title: Shriners

text: Any child under the age of 18 can be admitted to the hospital if, in the opinion of the doctors, the child can be treated. There is no requirement for religion, race or relationship to a Shriner.


title: Shriners

text: Until June 2012, all care at Shriners Hospitals was provided without charge to patients and their families. At that time, because the size of their endowment had decreased due to losses in the stock market, Shriners Hospitals started billing patients' insurance companies, but still offered free care to children without insurance and waives all out of pocket costs insurance does not cover. Shriners Hospitals for Children is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, meaning that they rely on the generosity of donors to cover the cost of treatment for their patients.


title: Shriners

text: In 2008, Shriners Hospitals had a total budget of $826 million. In 2007 they approved 39,454 new patient applications, and attended to the needs of 125,125 patients. Shriners Hospitals for Children can be found in these cities:


title: Shriners

text: Most Shrine Temples support several parade units. These units are responsible for promoting a positive Shriner image to the public by participating in local parades. The parade units often include miniature cars powered by lawn mower engines.


title: Shriners

text: An example of a Shrine parade unit is the Heart Shrine Clubs' Original Fire Patrol of Effingham, Illinois. This unit operates miniature fire engines, memorializing a hospital fire that took place in the 1940s in Effingham. They participate in most parades in a 100-mile radius of Effingham. Shriners in Dallas, Texas participate annually in the Twilight Parade at the Texas State Fair.


title: Shriners

text: Shriners in St. Louis have several parade motor units, including miniature cars styled after 1932 Ford coupes and 1970s-era Jeep CJ models, and a unit of miniature Indianapolis-styled race cars. Some of these are outfitted with alcohol-fueled engines.


title: Shriners

text: The Shriners originally hosted a golf tournament in association with singer/actor Justin Timberlake, titled the "Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open", a PGA Tour golf tournament held in Las Vegas, Nevada. The relationship between Timberlake and the Shriners ended in 2012, due to the lack of previously agreed participation on Timberlake's part. In July 2012, the PGA Tour and Shriners Hospitals for Children announced a five-year title sponsorship extension, carrying the commitment to the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open through 2017. now titled "The Shriners Hospitals for Children Open", It is still held in Las Vegas, Nevada.


title: Shriners

text: Once a year, the fraternity meets for the Imperial Council Session in a major North American city. It is not uncommon for these conventions to have 20,000 participants or more.


title: Shriners

text: In 1980, Ray Stevens recorded the country-and-western novelty song "Shriner's Convention" about a said convention.


title: Cyborg

text: A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of cybernetic" and organism"—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline.


title: Cyborg

text: "Cyborg" is not the same thing as bionics, biorobotics, or androids; it applies to an organism that has restored function or, especially, enhanced abilities due to the integration of some artificial component or technology that relies on some sort of feedback, for example prostheses, artificial organs, implants or, in some cases, wearable technology.<ref name="10.1080/14606925.2019.1594986"></ref> Cyborg technologies may enable or support collective intelligence. A related, possibly broader, term is the "augmented human". While cyborgs are commonly thought of as mammals, including humans, they might also conceivably be any kind of organism.


title: Cyborg

text: D. S. Halacy's "Cyborg: Evolution of the Superman" (1965) featured an introduction which spoke of a "new frontier" that was "not merely space, but more profoundly the relationship between 'inner space' to 'outer space' – a bridge...between mind and matter."


title: Cyborg

text: According to Donna Haraway, for as long as machines and technology have existed, a love-hate relationship has also existed between them and humanity. Haraway is at the forefront of this and dissects the interconnectedness of humans and technology.


title: Cyborg

text: She has written the Cyborg Manifesto, which is a break-down of her views of cyborgs and the route that humanity is toward that concept. Haraway is a self-claimed cyborg, a product of science and technology, nothing special or different. In the modern-day and age, humanity has become so woven in with technology that it is hard to tell where the line that divides them is. This is especially apparent in medicine with the modifications we are now able to accomplish with modern science and technology.


title: Cyborg

text: As humans advance as a society, Haraway explains how all boundaries between humans, animals, and technology have been breached. This breach leads to hybrids and more complexities. Every place that meets the eye there is some form of technology that humans need and depend on. Science and technology have evolved so far that we rely on them for every little task in our life. There is somewhat of a cyborg age upon us. Just how Haraway’s world is filled with these tangled networks of humans and machines, our bodies are networks in themselves. It is not as natural as made out to be, it is fed food, kept alive on pharmaceuticals, and altered through medical procedures. Haraway believes that in order to survive we need to get behind the complex nature of technoculture.


title: Cyborg

text: This article can also be viewed from a feminist lens. Throughout history, women have always been told that they are “naturally” weak, submissive, and overemotional. But, if we are cyborgs as Haraway says, then all of us can be reconstructed and improved. There exists the ability to construct your identity, sexuality, and all just as you please to do so.


title: Cyborg

text: Since we have allowed and created machines and technology to be so advanced, there should be no reason to fear what we have created. Cyborgs should be embraced because they are now part of human identities. This being said, it is important to empathize with both sides because only having one perspective can cause more harm than good.


title: Cyborg

text: According to some definitions of the term, the physical attachments that humans have with even the most basic technologies have already made them cyborgs. In a typical example, a human with an artificial cardiac pacemaker or implantable cardioverter-defibrillator, would be considered a cyborg, since these devices measure voltage potentials in the body, perform signal processing, and can deliver electrical stimuli, using this synthetic feedback mechanism to keep that person alive. Implants, especially cochlear implants, that combine mechanical modification with any kind of feedback response are also cyborg enhancements. Some theorists cite such modifications as contact lenses, hearing aids, smartphones, or intraocular lenses as examples of fitting humans with technology to enhance their biological capabilities.


title: Cyborg

text: As cyborgs currently are on the rise, some theorists argue there is a need to develop new definitions of aging. (For instance, a bio-techno-social definition of "aging" has been suggested.)


title: Cyborg

text: The term is also used to address human-technology mixtures in the abstract. This includes not only commonly-used pieces of technology such as phones, computers, the Internet, and so on, but also artifacts that may not popularly be considered technology; for example, pen and paper, and speech and language. When augmented with these technologies and connected in communication with people in other times and places, a person becomes capable of much more than they were before. An example is a computer, which gains power by using Internet protocols to connect with other computers. Another example is a social-media bot—either a bot-assisted human or a human-assisted-bot—used to target social media with likes and shares. Cybernetic technologies include highways, pipes, electrical wiring, buildings, electrical plants, libraries, and other infrastructure that people hardly notice, but which are critical parts of the cybernetics that humans work within.


title: Cyborg

text: Bruce Sterling, in his Shaper/Mechanist universe, suggested an idea of an alternative cyborg called 'Lobster', which is made not by using internal implants, but by using an external shell (e.g. a powered exoskeleton). Unlike human cyborgs, who appear human externally but are synthetic internally (e.g., the Bishop type in the "Alien" franchise), Lobster looks inhuman externally but contains a human internally (such as in "Elysium" and "RoboCop"). The computer game "" prominently features cyborgs called Omar, Russian for 'lobster'.


title: Cyborg

text: In science fiction, the most stereotypical portrayal of a cyborg is a person (or, more rarely, an animal) with visible added mechanical parts. These include the superhero Cyborg from DC Comics and the Borg race from the "Star Trek" Universe.


title: Cyborg

text: However, cyborgs can also be portrayed as looking more robotic or more organic. They may appear as humanoid robots, such as Robotman from DC's "Doom Patrol" or most varieties of the Cybermen from "Doctor Who"; they can appear as non-humanoid robots such as the Daleks (again, from "Doctor Who") or like the majority of the motorball players in "Battle Angel Alita" and its prequel "Ashen Victor".


title: Cyborg

text: More human-appearing cyborgs may cover up their mechanical parts with armor or clothing, such as Darth Vader ("Star Wars") or Misty Knight (Marvel Comics). Cyborgs may have mechanical parts or bodies that appear human. For example, the eponymous Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman (from their respective television series) have prostheses externally identical to the body parts that they replaced; while Major Motoko Kusanagi ("Ghost in the Shell") is a full-body cyborg whose body appears human. In these examples, among others, it is common for cyborgs to have superhuman (physical or mental) abilities, including great strength, enhanced senses, computer-assisted brains, or built-in weaponry.


title: Cyborg

text: The concept of a man-machine mixture was widespread in science fiction before World War II. As early as 1843, Edgar Allan Poe described a man with extensive prostheses in the short story "The Man That Was Used Up". In 1911, Jean de La Hire introduced the Nyctalope, a science fiction hero who was perhaps the first literary cyborg, in "Le Mystère des XV" (later translated as "The Nyctalope on Mars"). Nearly two decades later, Edmond Hamilton presented space explorers with a mixture of organic and machine parts in his 1928 novel "The Comet Doom". He later featured the talking, living brain of an old scientist, Simon Wright, floating around in a transparent case, in all the adventures of his famous hero, Captain Future. In 1944, in the short story "No Woman Born", C. L. Moore wrote of Deirdre, a dancer, whose body was burned completely and whose brain was placed in a faceless but beautiful and supple mechanical body.


title: Cyborg

text: In 1960, the term "cyborg" was coined by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline to refer to their conception of an enhanced human being who could survive in extraterrestrial environments:


title: Cyborg

text: Their concept was the outcome of thinking about the need for an intimate relationship between human and machine as the new frontier of space exploration was beginning to open up. A designer of physiological instrumentation and electronic data-processing systems, Clynes was the chief research scientist in the Dynamic Simulation Laboratory at Rockland State Hospital in New York.


title: Cyborg

text: The term first appears in print 5 months earlier when "The New York Times" reported on the "Psychophysiological Aspects of Space Flight Symposium" where Clynes and Kline first presented their paper:


title: Cyborg

text: Thereafter, Hamilton would first use the term "cyborg" explicitly in the 1962 short story, "After a Judgment Day", to describe the "mechanical analogs" called "Charlies," explaining that "[c]yborgs, they had been called from the first one in the 1960s...cybernetic organisms."


title: Cyborg

text: In 2001, a book titled "Cyborg: Digital Destiny and Human Possibility in the Age of the Wearable Computer" was published by Doubleday. Some of the ideas in the book were incorporated into the documentary film "Cyberman" that same year.


title: Cyborg

text: Cyborg tissues structured with carbon nanotubes and plant or fungal cells have been used in artificial tissue engineering to produce new materials for mechanical and electrical uses.


title: Cyborg

text: Such work was presented by Raffaele Di Giacomo, Bruno Maresca, and others, at the Materials Research Society's spring conference on 3 April 2013. The cyborg obtained was inexpensive, light and had unique mechanical properties. It could also be shaped in the desired forms. Cells combined with multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) co-precipitated as a specific aggregate of cells and nanotubes that formed a viscous material. Likewise, dried cells still acted as a stable matrix for the MWCNT network. When observed by optical microscopy, the material resembled an artificial "tissue" composed of highly packed cells. The effect of cell drying was manifested by their "ghost cell" appearance. A rather specific physical interaction between MWCNTs and cells was observed by electron microscopy, suggesting that the cell wall (the outermost part of fungal and plant cells) may play a major active role in establishing a carbon nanotube's network and its stabilization. This novel material can be used in a wide range of electronic applications, from heating to sensing. For instance, using "Candida albicans" cells, a species of yeast that often lives inside the human gastrointestinal tract, cyborg tissue materials with temperature sensing properties have been reported.


title: Cyborg

text: In current prosthetic applications, the C-Leg system developed by Otto Bock HealthCare, is used to replace a human leg that has been amputated because of injury or illness. The use of sensors in the artificial C-Leg aids in walking significantly by attempting to replicate the user's natural gait, as it would be prior to amputation. A similar system is being developed by the Swedish orthopedic company Integrum, the OPRA Implant System, which is surgically anchored and integrated by means of osseointegration into the skeleton of the remainder of the amputated limb. The same company has developed e-OPRA, a will-powered upper limb prosthesis system that is being evaluated in a clinical trial to allow sensory input to the central nervous system using pressure and temperature sensors in the prosthesis' finger tips. Prostheses like the C-Leg, the e-OPRA Implant System, and the iLimb, are considered by some to be the first real steps towards the next generation of real-world cyborg applications. Additionally cochlear implants and magnetic implants which provide people with a sense that they would not otherwise have had can additionally be thought of as creating cyborgs..


title: Cyborg

text: In vision science, direct brain implants have been used to treat non-congenital (acquired) blindness. One of the first scientists to come up with a working brain interface to restore sight was a private researcher William Dobelle.


title: Cyborg

text: Dobelle's first prototype was implanted into "Jerry", a man blinded in adulthood, in 1978. A single-array BCI containing 68 electrodes was implanted onto Jerry's visual cortex and succeeded in producing phosphenes, the sensation of seeing light. The system included cameras mounted on glasses to send signals to the implant. Initially, the implant allowed Jerry to see shades of grey in a limited field of vision at a low frame-rate. This also required him to be hooked up to a two-ton mainframe, but shrinking electronics and faster computers made his artificial eye more portable and now enable him to perform simple tasks unassisted.


title: Cyborg

text: In 1997, Philip Kennedy, a scientist and physician, created the world's first human cyborg from Johnny Ray, a Vietnam veteran who suffered a stroke. Ray's body, as doctors called it, was "locked in". Ray wanted his old life back so he agreed to Kennedy's experiment. Kennedy embedded an implant he designed (and named a "neurotrophic electrode") near the injured part of Ray's brain so that Ray would be able to have some movement back in his body. The surgery went successfully, but in 2002, Ray died.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2002, Canadian Jens Naumann, also blinded in adulthood, became the first in a series of 16 paying patients to receive Dobelle's second-generation implant, marking one of the earliest commercial uses of BCIs. The second-generation device used a more sophisticated implant enabling better mapping of phosphenes into coherent vision. Phosphenes are spread out across the visual field in what researchers call the starry-night effect. Immediately after his implant, Naumann was able to use his imperfectly restored vision to drive slowly around the parking area of the research institute.


title: Cyborg

text: In contrast to replacement technologies, in 2002, under the heading Project Cyborg, a British scientist, Kevin Warwick, had an array of 100 electrodes fired into his nervous system in order to link his nervous system into the internet to investigate enhancement possibilities. With this in place, Warwick successfully carried out a series of experiments including extending his nervous system over the internet to control a robotic hand, also receiving feedback from the fingertips in order to control the hand's grip. This was a form of extended sensory input. Subsequently, he investigated ultrasonic input in order to remotely detect the distance to objects. Finally, with electrodes also implanted into his wife's nervous system, they conducted the first direct electronic communication experiment between the nervous systems of two humans.<ref name="doi10.1001/archneur.60.10.1369|noedit"></ref>


title: Cyborg

text: Since 2004, British artist Neil Harbisson has had a cyborg antenna implanted in his head that allows him to extend his perception of colors beyond the human visual spectrum through vibrations in his skull. His antenna was included within his 2004 passport photograph which has been claimed to confirm his cyborg status. In 2012 at TEDGlobal, Harbisson explained that he started to feel like a cyborg when he noticed that the software and his brain had united and given him an extra sense. Neil Harbisson is a co-founder of the Cyborg Foundation (2004) and cofounded the Transpecies Society in 2017, which is an association that empowers individuals with non-human identities and supports them in their decisions to develop unique senses and new organs. Neil Harbisson is a global advocate for the rights of cyborgs.


title: Cyborg

text: Rob Spence, a Toronto-based filmmaker, who titles himself a real-life "Eyeborg," severely damaged his right eye in a shooting accident on his grandfather's farm as a child.


title: Cyborg

text: Many years later, in 2005, he decided to have his ever-deteriorating and now technically blind eye surgically removed, whereafter he wore an eyepatch for some time before he later, after having played for some time with the idea of installing a camera instead, contacted professor Steve Mann at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an expert in wearable computing and cyborg technology.


title: Cyborg

text: Under Mann's guidance, Spence, at age 36, created a prototype in the form of the miniature camera which could be fitted inside his prosthetic eye; an invention that would come to be named by "Time" magazine as one of the best inventions of 2009. The bionic eye records everything he sees and contains a 1.5 mm, low-resolution video camera, a small round printed circuit board, a wireless video transmitter, which allows him to transmit what he is seeing in real-time to a computer, and a 3-volt rechargeable VARTA microbattery. The eye is not connected to his brain and has not restored his sense of vision. Additionally, Spence has also installed a laser-like LED light in one version of the prototype.


title: Cyborg

text: Furthermore, many cyborgs with multifunctional radio frequency identification (RFID) microchips injected into a hand are known to exist. With the chips they are able to swipe cards, open or unlock doors, operate devices such as printers or, with some using cryptocurrency, buy products, such as drinks, with a wave of the hand.


title: Cyborg

text: bodyNET is an application of human-electronic interaction currently in development by researchers from Stanford University. The technology is based on stretchable semiconductor materials (Elastronic). According to their article in "Nature", the technology is composed of smart devices, screens, and a network of sensors that can be implanted into the body, woven into the skin or worn as clothes. It has been suggested, that this platform can potentially replace the smartphone in the future.


title: Cyborg

text: The US-based company Backyard Brains released what they refer to as the "world's first commercially available cyborg" called the RoboRoach. The project started as a senior design project for a University of Michigan biomedical engineering student in 2010, and was launched as an available beta product on 25 February 2011. The RoboRoach was officially released into production via a TED talk at the TED Global conference; and via the crowdsourcing website Kickstarter in 2013, the kit allows students to use microstimulation to momentarily control the movements of a walking cockroach (left and right) using a Bluetooth-enabled smartphone as the controller.


title: Cyborg

text: Other groups have developed cyborg insects, including researchers at North Carolina State University, UC Berkeley, and Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, but the RoboRoach was the first kit available to the general public and was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health as a device to serve as a teaching aid to promote an interest in neuroscience. Several animal welfare organizations including the RSPCA and PETA have expressed concerns about the ethics and welfare of animals in this project. In 2022, remote controlled cyborg cockroaches functional if moving (or moved) to sunlight for recharging were presented. They could be used e.g. for purposes of inspecting hazardous areas or quickly finding humans underneath hard-to-access rubbles at disaster sites.<ref name="10.1038/s41528-022-00207-2">


title: Cyborg

text: In the late 2010s, scientists created cyborg jellyfish using a microelectronic prosthetic that propels the animal to swim almost three times faster while using just twice the metabolic energy of their unmodified peers. The prosthetics can be removed without harming the jellyfish.


title: Cyborg

text: In medicine, there are two important and different types of cyborgs: the restorative and the enhanced. Restorative technologies "restore lost function, organs, and limbs." The key aspect of restorative cyborgization is the repair of broken or missing processes to revert to a healthy or average level of function. There is no enhancement to the original faculties and processes that were lost.


title: Cyborg

text: On the contrary, the enhanced cyborg "follows a principle, and it is the principle of optimal performance: maximising output (the information or modifications obtained) and minimising input (the energy expended in the process)". Thus, the enhanced cyborg intends to exceed normal processes or even gain new functions that were not originally present.


title: Cyborg

text: Although prostheses in general supplement lost or damaged body parts with the integration of a mechanical artifice, bionic implants in medicine allow model organs or body parts to mimic the original function more closely. Michael Chorost wrote a memoir of his experience with cochlear implants, or bionic ears, titled "Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human". Jesse Sullivan became one of the first people to operate a fully robotic limb through a nerve-muscle graft, enabling him a complex range of motions beyond that of previous prosthetics. By 2004, a fully functioning artificial heart was developed. The continued technological development of bionic and (bio-)nanotechnologies begins to raise the question of enhancement, and of the future possibilities for cyborgs which surpass the original functionality of the biological model. The ethics and desirability of "enhancement prosthetics" have been debated; their proponents include the transhumanist movement, with its belief that new technologies can assist the human race in developing beyond its present, normative limitations such as aging and disease, as well as other, more general inabilities, such as limitations on speed, strength, endurance, and intelligence. Opponents of the concept describe what they believe to be biases which propel the development and acceptance of such technologies; namely, a bias towards functionality and efficiency that may compel assent to a view of human people which de-emphasizes as defining characteristics actual manifestations of humanity and personhood, in favor of definition in terms of upgrades, versions, and utility.


title: Cyborg

text: A brain–computer interface, or BCI, provides a direct path of communication from the brain to an external device, effectively creating a cyborg. Research into invasive BCIs, which utilize electrodes implanted directly into the grey matter of the brain, has focused on restoring damaged eyesight in the blind and providing functionality to paralyzed people, most notably those with severe cases, such as locked-in syndrome. This technology could enable people who are missing a limb or are in a wheelchair the power to control the devices that aid them through neural signals sent from the brain implants directly to computers or the devices. It is possible that this technology will also eventually be used with healthy people.


title: Cyborg

text: Deep brain stimulation is a neurological surgical procedure used for therapeutic purposes. This process has aided in treating patients diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, Tourette syndrome, epilepsy, chronic headaches, and mental disorders. After the patient is unconscious, through anesthesia, brain pacemakers or electrodes, are implanted into the region of the brain where the cause of the disease is present. The region of the brain is then stimulated by bursts of electric current to disrupt the oncoming surge of seizures. Like all invasive procedures, deep brain stimulation may put the patient at a higher risk. However, there have been more improvements in recent years with deep brain stimulation than any available drug treatment.


title: Cyborg

text: Retinal implants are another form of cyborgization in medicine. The theory behind retinal stimulation to restore vision to people suffering from retinitis pigmentosa and vision loss due to aging (conditions in which people have an abnormally low number of retinal ganglion cells) is that the retinal implant and electrical stimulation would act as a substitute for the missing ganglion cells (cells which connect the eye to the brain).


title: Cyborg

text: While work to perfect this technology is still being done, there have already been major advances in the use of electronic stimulation of the retina to allow the eye to sense patterns of light. A specialized camera is worn by the subject, such as on the frames of their glasses, which converts the image into a pattern of electrical stimulation. A chip located in the user's eye would then electrically stimulate the retina with this pattern by exciting certain nerve endings which transmit the image to the optic centers of the brain and the image would then appear to the user. If technological advances proceed as planned, this technology may be used by thousands of blind people and restore vision to most of them.


title: Cyborg

text: A similar process has been created to aid people who have lost their vocal cords. This experimental device would do away with previously used robotic-sounding voice simulators. The transmission of sound would start with a surgery to redirect the nerve that controls the voice and sound production to a muscle in the neck, where a nearby sensor would be able to pick up its electrical signals. The signals would then move to a processor which would control the timing and pitch of a voice simulator. That simulator would then vibrate producing a multi-tonal sound that could be shaped into words by the mouth.


title: Cyborg

text: An article published in "Nature Materials" in 2012 reported research on "cyborg tissues" (engineered human tissues with embedded three-dimensional mesh of nanoscale wires), with possible medical implications.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2014, researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and Washington University in St. Louis had developed a device that could keep a heart beating endlessly. By using 3D printing and computer modeling, these scientists developed an electronic membrane that could successfully replace pacemakers. The device utilizes a "spider-web like network of sensors and electrodes" to monitor and maintain a normal heart rate with electrical stimuli. Unlike traditional pacemakers that are similar from patient to patient, the elastic heart glove is made custom by using high-resolution imaging technology. The first prototype was created to fit a rabbit's heart, operating the organ in an oxygen and nutrient-rich solution. The stretchable material and circuits of the apparatus were first constructed by Professor John A. Rogers in which the electrodes are arranged in an s-shape design to allow them to expand and bend without breaking. Although the device is only currently used as a research tool to study changes in heart rate, in the future the membrane may serve as a safeguard against heart attacks.


title: Cyborg

text: Automated insulin delivery systems, colloquially also known as the "artificial pancreas", are a substitute for the lack of natural insulin production by the body, most notably in Type 1 diabetes. Currently available systems combine a continuous glucose monitor with an insulin pump that can be remote controlled, forming a control loop that automatically adjusts the insulin dosage depending on the current blood glucose level. Examples of commercial systems that implement such a control loop are the MiniMed 670G from Medtronic and the t:slim x2 from Tandem Diabetes Care. Do-it-yourself artificial pancreas technologies also exist, though these are not verified or approved by any regulatory agency. Upcoming next-generation artificial pancreas technologies include automatic glucagon infusion in addition to insulin, to help prevent hypoglycemia and improve efficiency. One example of such a bi-hormonal system is the Beta Bionics iLet.


title: Cyborg

text: Military organizations' research has recently focused on the utilization of cyborg animals for the purposes of a supposed tactical advantage. DARPA has announced its interest in developing "cyborg insects" to transmit data from sensors implanted into the insect during the pupa stage. The insect's motion would be controlled from a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) and could conceivably survey an environment or detect explosives and gas. Similarly, DARPA is developing a neural implant to remotely control the movement of sharks. The shark's unique senses would then be exploited to provide data feedback in relation to enemy ship movement or underwater explosives.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2006, researchers at Cornell University invented a new surgical procedure to implant artificial structures into insects during their metamorphic development. The first insect cyborgs, moths with integrated electronics in their thorax, were demonstrated by the same researchers. The initial success of the techniques has resulted in increased research and the creation of a program called Hybrid-Insect-MEMS (HI-MEMS). Its goal, according to DARPA's Microsystems Technology Office, is to develop "tightly coupled machine-insect interfaces by placing micro-mechanical systems inside the insects during the early stages of metamorphosis."


title: Cyborg

text: The use of neural implants has recently been attempted, with success, on cockroaches. Surgically applied electrodes were put on the insect, which was remotely controlled by a human. The results, although sometimes different, basically showed that the cockroach could be controlled by the impulses it received through the electrodes. DARPA is now funding this research because of its obvious beneficial applications to the military and other areas


title: Cyborg

text: In 2009 at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) MEMS conference in Italy, researchers demonstrated the first "wireless" flying-beetle cyborg. Engineers at the University of California, Berkeley, have pioneered the design of a "remote-controlled beetle", funded by the DARPA HI-MEMS Program. This was followed later that year by the demonstration of wireless control of a "lift-assisted" moth-cyborg.


title: Cyborg

text: Eventually researchers plan to develop HI-MEMS for dragonflies, bees, rats, and pigeons. For the HI-MEMS cybernetic bug to be considered a success, it must fly from a starting point, guided via computer into a controlled landing within of a specific end point. Once landed, the cybernetic bug must remain in place.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2020, an article published in "Science Robotics" by researchers at the University of Washington reported a mechanically steerable wireless camera attached to beetles. Miniature cameras weighing 248 mg were attached to live beetles of the Tenebrionid genera "Asbolus" and "Eleodes". The camera wirelessly streamed video to a smartphone via Bluetooth for up to 6 hours and the user could remotely steer the camera to achieve a bug's-eye view.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2016, Cybathlon became the first cyborg 'Olympics'; celebrated in Zurich, Switzerland, it was the first worldwide and official celebration of cyborg sports. In this event, 16 teams of people with disabilities used technological developments to turn themselves into cyborg athletes. There were 6 different events and its competitors used and controlled advanced technologies such as powered prosthetic legs and arms, robotic exoskeletons, bikes, and motorized wheelchairs.


title: Cyborg

text: This was already a remarkable improvement, as it allowed disabled people to compete and showed the several technological enhancements that are already making a difference; however, it showed that there is still a long way to go. For instance, the exoskeleton race still required its participants to stand up from a chair and sit down, navigate a slalom and other simple activities such as walking over stepping stones and climbing up and down stairs. Despite the simplicity of these activities, 8 of the 16 teams that participated in the event drop off before the start.


title: Cyborg

text: Nonetheless, one of the main goals of this event and such simple activities is to show how technological enhancements and advanced prosthetics can make a difference in people's lives. The next Cybathlon that was expected to occur in 2020, was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.


title: Cyborg

text: The concept of the cyborg is often associated with science fiction. However, many artists have tried to create public awareness of cybernetic organisms; these can range from paintings to installations. Some artists who create such works are Neil Harbisson, Moon Ribas, Patricia Piccinini, Steve Mann, Orlan, H. R. Giger, Lee Bul, Wafaa Bilal, Tim Hawkinson, and Stelarc.


title: Cyborg

text: Stelarc is a performance artist who has visually probed and acoustically amplified his body. He uses medical instruments, prosthetics, robotics, virtual reality systems, the Internet and biotechnology to explore alternate, intimate and involuntary interfaces with the body. He has made three films of the inside of his body and has performed with a third hand and a virtual arm. Between 1976 and 1988 he completed 25 body suspension performances with hooks into the skin. For 'Third Ear', he surgically constructed an extra ear within his arm that was internet-enabled, making it a publicly accessible acoustical organ for people in other places. He is presently performing as his avatar from his second life site.


title: Cyborg

text: Tim Hawkinson promotes the idea that bodies and machines are coming together as one, where human features are combined with technology to create the Cyborg. Hawkinson's piece "Emoter" presented how society is now dependent on technology.


title: Cyborg

text: Wafaa Bilal is an Iraqi-American performance artist who had a small 10-megapixel digital camera surgically implanted into the back of his head, part of a project entitled 3rd I. For one year, beginning 15 December 2010, an image was captured once per minute 24 hours a day and streamed live to and the . The site also displays Bilal's location via GPS. Bilal says that the reason why he put the camera in the back of the head was to make an "allegorical statement about the things we don't see and leave behind." As a professor at NYU, this project raised privacy issues, and so Bilal was asked to ensure that his camera did take photographs in NYU buildings.


title: Cyborg

text: Machines are becoming more ubiquitous in the artistic process itself, with computerized drawing pads replacing pen and paper, and drum machines becoming nearly as popular as human drummers. Composers such as Brian Eno have developed and utilized software that can build entire musical scores from a few basic mathematical parameters.


title: Cyborg

text: Scott Draves is a generative artist whose work is explicitly described as a "cyborg mind". His Electric Sheep project generates abstract art by combining the work of many computers and people over the internet.


title: Cyborg

text: Artists have explored the term "cyborg" from a perspective involving imagination. Some work to make an abstract idea of technological and human-bodily union apparent to reality in an art form utilizing varying mediums, from sculptures and drawings to digital renderings.


title: Cyborg

text: Artists who seek to make cyborg-based fantasies a reality often call themselves cyborg artists, or may consider their artwork "cyborg". How an artist or their work may be considered cyborg will vary depending upon the interpreter's flexibility with the term.


title: Cyborg

text: Scholars that rely upon a strict, technical description of a cyborg, often going by Norbert Wiener's cybernetic theory and Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline's first use of the term, would likely argue that most cyborg artists do not qualify to be considered cyborgs. Scholars considering a more flexible description of cyborgs may argue it incorporates more than cybernetics. Others may speak of defining subcategories, or specialized cyborg types, that qualify different levels of cyborg at which technology influences an individual. This may range from technological instruments being external, temporary, and removable to being fully integrated and permanent. Nonetheless, cyborg artists are artists. Being so, it can be expected for them to incorporate the cyborg idea rather than a strict, technical representation of the term, seeing how their work will sometimes revolve around other purposes outside of cyborgism.


title: Cyborg

text: As medical technology becomes more advanced, some techniques and innovations are adopted by the body modification community. While not yet cyborgs in the strict definition of Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline, technological developments like implantable silicon silk electronics, augmented reality and QR codes are bridging the disconnect between technology and the body. Hypothetical technologies such as digital tattoo interfaces would blend body modification aesthetics with interactivity and functionality, bringing a transhumanist way of life into present day reality.


title: Cyborg

text: In addition, it is quite plausible for anxiety expression to manifest. Individuals may experience pre-implantation feelings of fear and nervousness. To this end, individuals may also embody feelings of uneasiness, particularly in a socialized setting, due to their post-operative, technologically augmented bodies, and mutual unfamiliarity with the mechanical insertion. Anxieties may be linked to notions of otherness or a cyborged identity.


title: Cyborg

text: Sending humans to space is a dangerous task in which the implementation of various cyborg technologies could be used in the future for risk mitigation. Stephen Hawking, a renowned physicist, stated "Life on Earth is at the ever-increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster such as sudden global warming, nuclear war... I think the human race has no future if it doesn't go into space." The difficulties associated with space travel could mean it might be centuries before humans ever become a multi-planet species. There are many effects of spaceflight on the human body. One major issue of space exploration is the biological need for oxygen. If this necessity was taken out of the equation, space exploration would be revolutionized. A theory proposed by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline is aimed at tackling this problem. The two scientists theorized that the use of an inverse fuel cell that is "capable of reducing CO2 to its components with the removal of the carbon and re-circulation of the oxygen..." could make breathing unnecessary. Another prominent issue is radiation exposure. Yearly, the average human on earth is exposed to approximately 0.30 rem of radiation, while an astronaut aboard the International Space Station for 90 days is exposed to 9 rem. To tackle the issue, Clynes and Kline theorized a cyborg containing a sensor that would detect radiation levels and a Rose osmotic pump "which would automatically inject protective pharmaceuticals in appropriate doses." Experiments injecting these protective pharmaceuticals into monkeys have shown positive results in increasing radiation resistance.


title: Cyborg

text: Although the effects of spaceflight on our bodies are an important issue, the advancement of propulsion technology is just as important. With our current technology, it would take us about 260 days to get to Mars. A study backed by NASA proposes an interesting way to tackle this issue through deep sleep, or torpor. With this technique, it would "reduce astronauts' metabolic functions with existing medical procedures." So far experiments have only resulted in patients being in torpor state for one week. Advancements to allow for longer states of deep sleep would lower the cost of the trip to Mars as a result of reduced astronaut resource consumption.


title: Cyborg

text: Theorists such as Andy Clark suggest that interactions between humans and technology result in the creation of a cyborg system. In this model, "cyborg" is defined as a part-biological, part-mechanical system that results in the augmentation of the biological component and the creation of a more complex whole. Clark argues that this broadened definition is necessary to an understanding of human cognition. He suggests that any tool which is used to offload part of a cognitive process may be considered the mechanical component of a cyborg system. Examples of this human and technology cyborg system can be very low tech and simplistic, such as using a calculator to perform basic mathematical operations or pen and paper to make notes, or as high tech as using a personal computer or phone. According to Clark, these interactions between a person and a form of technology integrate that technology into the cognitive process in a way that is analogous to the way that a technology that would fit the traditional concept of cyborg augmentation becomes integrated with its biological host. Because all humans in some way use technology to augment their cognitive processes, Clark comes to the conclusion that we are "natural-born cyborgs." Professor Donna Haraway also theorizes that people, metaphorically or literally, have been cyborgs since the late twentieth century. If one considers the mind and body as one, much of humanity is aided with technology in almost every way, which hybridizes humans with technology.


title: Cyborg

text: Given the technical scope of current and future implantable sensory/telemetric devices, such devices will be greatly proliferated, and will have connections to commercial, medical, and governmental networks. For example, in the medical sector, patients will be able to log in to their home computer, and thus visit virtual doctor's offices, medical databases, and receive medical prognoses from the comfort of their own home from the data collected through their implanted telemetric devices. However, this online network presents large security concerns because it has been proven by several U.S. universities that hackers could get onto these networks and shut down peoples' electronic prosthetics. Cyborg data mining refers to the collection of data produced by implantable devices.


title: Cyborg

text: These sorts of technologies are already present in the U.S. workforce as a firm in River Falls, Wisconsin, called Three Square Market partnered with a Swedish firm Biohacks Technology to implant RFID microchips (which are about the size of a grain of rice) in the hands of its employees that allow employees to access offices, computers, and even vending machines. More than 50 of the firm's 85 employees were chipped. It was confirmed that the American Food and Drug Administration approved of these implantations. If these devices are to be proliferated within society, then the question that begs to be answered is what regulatory agency will oversee the operations, monitoring, and security of these devices? According to this case study of Three Square Market, it seems that the FDA is assuming a role in regulating and monitoring these devices. It has been argued that a new regulatory framework needs to be developed so that the law keeps up with developments in implantable technologies.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2010, the Cyborg Foundation became the world's first international organization dedicated to help humans become cyborgs. The foundation was created by cyborg Neil Harbisson and Moon Ribas as a response to the growing number of letters and emails received from people around the world interested in becoming cyborgs. The foundation's main aims are to extend human senses and abilities by creating and applying cybernetic extensions to the body, to promote the use of cybernetics in cultural events and to defend cyborg rights. In 2010, the foundation, based in Mataró (Barcelona), was the overall winner of the Cre@tic Awards, organized by Tecnocampus Mataró.


title: Cyborg

text: In 2012, Spanish film director Rafel Duran Torrent, created a short film about the Cyborg Foundation. In 2013, the film won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival's Focus Forward Filmmakers Competition and was awarded US$100,000.


title: Cyborg

text: Cyborgs have become a well-known part of science fiction literature and other media. Although many of these characters may be technically androids, they are often erroneously referred to as cyborgs.


title: Cyborg

text: Perhaps the best known examples of cyborgs in popular culture are the Terminator, the Borg from "Star Trek" and the Daleks and Cybermen from "Doctor Who." Other prominent cyborgs include RoboCop, Evangelion, characters from "Universal Soldier", United States Air Force Colonel Steve Austin in both the novel "Cyborg" and, as acted out by Lee Majors, "The Six Million Dollar Man," the Replicants from "Blade Runner", Darth Vader, Lobot, and General Grievous from "Star Wars", "Inspector Gadget" and the Cylons from the 2004 "Battlestar Galactica" series.


title: Cyborg

text: From American comic books are characters including Deathlok and Victor "Cyborg" Stone; and manga and anime characters including 8 Man (the inspiration for "RoboCop"), Kamen Rider, "Battle Tendency"s Rudol von Stroheim, and "Ghost in the Shell"s Motoko Kusanagi.


title: Cyborg

text: Player characters such as Kano, Jax, Cyrax, and Sektor from the "Mortal Kombat" franchise, as well as Genji, an advanced cyborg ninja, who appears in "Overwatch" and "Heroes of the Storm", are examples of cyborgs in video games. The "Deus Ex" video game series deals extensively with the near-future rise of cyborgs and their corporate ownership, as does the "Syndicate" series.


title: Cyborg

text: William Gibson's "Neuromancer" features one of the first female cyborgs, a "Razorgirl" named Molly Millions, who has extensive cybernetic modifications and is one of the most prolific cyberpunk characters in the science fiction canon. The cyborg was also a central part of singer Janelle Monáe's 48-minute video corresponding with the release of her 2018 album "Dirty Computer." This "emotion picture" intertwined the relationship between human and technology, highlighting the power of the digital on a futuristic, dystopian society. Monáe has previously referred to herself as an android, depicting herself as a mechanical organism often conforming to idealistic standards, thus using the cyborg as a way to detach from these oppressive structures.


title: Aliyah

text: Aliyah (, ; "ʿălīyyā", ) is the immigration of Jews from the diaspora to, historically, the geographical Land of Israel, which is in the modern era chiefly represented by the State of Israel. Traditionally described as "the act of going up" (towards the Jewish holy city of Jerusalem), moving to the Land of Israel or "making aliyah" is one of the most basic tenets of Zionism. The opposite action—emigration by Jews from the Land of Israel—is referred to in the Hebrew language as "yerida" (). The Law of Return that was passed by the Israeli parliament in 1950 gives all diaspora Jews, as well as their children and grandchildren, the right to relocate to Israel and acquire Israeli citizenship on the basis of connecting to their Jewish identity.


title: Aliyah

text: For much of their history, most Jews have lived in the diaspora outside of the Land of Israel due to various historical conflicts that led to their persecution alongside multiple instances of expulsions and exoduses, with the most recent such event being the Jewish–Roman wars. Despite its historical value as a national aspiration for the Jewish people, aliyah was acted upon by few prior to the rise of a national awakening among Jews worldwide and the subsequent development of the Zionist movement in the late 19th century; the large-scale immigration of Jews to Palestine had consequently begun by 1882. Since the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948, more than 3 million Jews have made aliyah. , Israel and the Israeli-occupied territories contain approximately 42.9 percent of the world's Jewish population.


title: Aliyah

text: Throughout the years of dispersion, a small-scale return migration of Diaspora Jews to the Land of Israel is characterized as the Pre-Modern Aliyah. Successive waves of Jewish settlement are an important aspect of the history of Jewish life in Israel. The "Land of Israel" ("Eretz Yisrael") is the Hebrew name for the region commonly known in English through the middle of the twentieth century, from the ancient Roman designation, as Palestine. This traditional Hebrew toponym, in turn, has lent its name to the modern State of Israel. Since the birth of Zionism in the late 19th century, the advocates of aliyah have striven to facilitate the settlement of Jewish refugees in Ottoman Palestine, Mandatory Palestine, and the sovereign State of Israel.


title: Aliyah

text: The following waves of migration have been identified: the First Aliyah and the Second Aliyah to Ottoman Palestine; the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Aliyah to Mandatory Palestine including Aliyah Bet (immigration done in spite of restrictive Mandatory law) between 1934 and 1948 and the Bericha of the Holocaust survivors; the aliyah from elsewhere in the Middle East and North Africa as well as the aliyah from Western and Communist countries following the Six-Day War with the 1968 Polish political crisis, as well as the aliyah from post-Soviet states in the 1990s. Today, most aliyah consists of voluntary migration for ideological, economic, or family reunification purposes.


title: Aliyah

text: "Aliyah" in Hebrew means "ascent" or "going up". Jewish tradition views traveling to the Land of Israel as an ascent, both geographically and metaphysically. In one opinion, the geographical sense preceded the metaphorical one, as most Jews going on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, which is situated at approximately 750 meters (2,500 feet) above sea level, had to climb to a higher geographic elevation. The reason is that many Jews in early rabbinic times used to live either in Egypt's Nile Delta and on the plains of Babylonia, which lay relatively low; or somewhere the Mediterranean Basin, from where they arrived by ship.


title: Aliyah

text: "Aliyah" is an important Jewish cultural concept and a fundamental component of Zionism. It is enshrined in Israel's Law of Return, which accords any Jew (deemed as such by halakha and/or Israeli secular law) and eligible non-Jews (a child and a grandchild of a Jew, the spouse of a Jew, the spouse of a child of a Jew and the spouse of a grandchild of a Jew), the legal right to assisted immigration and settlement in Israel, as well as Israeli citizenship.


title: Aliyah

text: Someone who "makes "aliyah"" is called an "oleh" (m.; pl. "olim") or "olah" (f.; pl. "olot"). Many religious Jews espouse "aliyah" as a return to the Promised land, and regard it as the fulfillment of God's biblical promise to the descendants of the Hebrew patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Nachmanides (the Ramban) includes making aliyah in his enumeration of the 613 commandments.


title: Aliyah

text: In the Talmud, at the end of tractate Ketubot, the Mishnah says: "A man may compel his entire household to go up with him to the land of Israel, but may not compel one to leave." The discussion on this passage in the Mishnah emphasizes the importance of living in Israel: "One should always live in the Land of Israel, even in a town most of whose inhabitants are idolaters, but let no one live outside the Land, even in a town most of whose inhabitants are Israelites; for whoever lives in the Land of Israel may be considered to have a God, but whoever lives outside the Land may be regarded as one who has no God."


title: Aliyah

text: Sifre says that the mitzvah (commandment) of living in Eretz Yisrael is as important as all the other mitzvot put together. There are many mitzvot such as shmita, the sabbatical year for farming, which can only be performed in Israel.