Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human (review)

"To thine own self be true."

William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Beginning a review of Michael Chorost's fascinating discussion of his cochlear implant metamorphosis, Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human, with this quote is apropos on several levels. First and foremost, this book is one man's personal narrative of growth after, at mid-life, he loses his remaining hearing and then receives a variation of it back with an implant. A self-described nerd with a limited social network and a new Ph.D., Chorost tells how the remaining hair cells in his ear suddenly and rapidly died while on a business trip (he was hard of hearing since birth before becoming deaf). His subsequent journey, from investigating to receiving and ultimately adjusting to his implant, is detailed in this book in both human and technical terms.

Michael Chorost is a writer and a researcher, having studied literature, including Shakespeare, in graduate school. But he is also a computer ace: his doctorate is in English and educational technology. All of these attributes shine through as we learn how machines that control aspects of people's physiology have been portrayed in fiction over time, and how they actually do so today in the form of cochlear implants. To illustrate his perspective about his implant experience, Chorost begins each chapter with a quote or two, and liberally cites the literature, both non-fiction and fantasy, throughout the text.

Among his favorite sources is Martin Caidin's novel, Cyborg, better known on television by the title The Six Million Dollar Man. In this novel, the main character, Steve Austin, receives sophisticated new limbs and struggles to control them and their electronic instructions. Chorost's take on such "cyborgs" is that they are people who have one or more physical attributes controlled by a computer, and the computer's programmed code actually imposes decisions on the user. In a cochlear implant, for example, the code—or in this case competing and upgradable versions of code—dictate exactly what one can hear. It is this computer technology that forms the basis for Chorost's own efforts to rebuild and grow with his new bionic ear.

But there is more to life than technology, of course; hence the subtitle of Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human. Chorost openly deals with his human struggles. In doing so, he provides analogies between the various goals he wants to achieve as a person and the goals that must be met adjusting to his mechanical cochlear implant. For example, one chapter discusses his coping with a software upgrade for his implant, and parallels that with his growth in dealing with the women he dates. About the technology he says, "Within an hour or two, I'd gotten an approximate fix on the software. It was creamy, which was good, and subdued, which was bad. ‘Creamy' in that the world sounded smoother and finer-grained. ‘Subdued' in that the world felt quieter and more remote. . . . [My audiologist] . . . warned me it might take weeks, even months, for me to fully adjust." (112) At the same time, still struggling to find that perfect personal relationship, he notes, after one failed, "As the months went by, I cautiously felt around the edges of my consciousness, anticipating the return of that black gloom. But it didn't return. My equilibrium bounced back after each unsuccessful date. . . . I was more in control of my body, and that allowed me to be more patient. An upgrade, in a certain way." (116)

Along the way toward achieving the mechanical and human goals Chorost establishes for himself, he introduces us to many interesting people, often with great humor. We meet his surgeon and audiologist, who tirelessly answer his long list of questions. We are introduced to individuals from the cochlear implant's manufacturer, who discuss their view of the future, and to his coworkers at the research...