This presentation is beyond fiction.
Current research in neuroscience and the extension and augmentation of senses is proceeding in directions that might sound to a twentieth century mind like science fiction. Progress is rapid but unevenly distributed: Some is directed by military, intelligence and corporate interests but beyond their concerns, we can discern the future shape of human identity itself in nascent forms.
The human body/brain is being hacked to explore radical applications for helping, healing, and harming this and future generations. Some can be done in garage-hacking style. The presenter, in fact, recently had lenses in both eyes removed and replaced with artificial ones engineered for the vision he wanted, a now-trivial surgery. The reach of new technologies promises an even more radical transformation in what it means to be human.
One area of research is the recovery of memories, the deletion of emotional charges from memories, the removal of specific memories, the alteration of the content of memories, and the implantation of new memories. Another seeks to read the mind at a distance and extract information. Another explores the use of genomes to understand and replicate thinking, feeling, and behavior patterns. Another implements mind-to-mind communication, using neuroscience to understand brains best suited for remote viewing as well as implants and non-invasive technologies that control the electromagnetic energies of the brain to enable psychokinesis, clairvoyance and telepathy.
Augmentation of human abilities is being achieved by splicing information from sensors integrated with existing neurological channels. To feel the magnetic field of the earth, see the infrared and ultraviolet parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, discern the yaw and pitch of airplanes, see and hear by going around our eyes and ears -- all this means we will experience the “self” in new ways.
Thieme concludes with quotes from remote viewer Joe McMoneagle, astronaut Edgar Mitchell, and his new novel FOAM to suggest the shape of the mind of the future. If you're 20 years old, you have at least a century of productive life ahead of you, so you had better be on board with the shape of your future selves. :-)