The cyborg body: Potentials and limits of a body with prosthetic limbs

Abstract Living with an artificial limb is a reality for millions of people around the world, and it is not without its challenges. The body of the prosthesis user must adapt to the presence of an external aid and the user must learn how to act in the world by means of it. We analyze such a “cyborg body” with the help of a cognitive semiotic framework, benefiting from pheno-methodological triangulation, and the conceptual-empirical loop. Further, adopting a broad notion of phenomenological embodiment, with focus on both lived experience and external representations, we show that claims that “the cyborg” is the very nature of humanity are mistaken as they misrepresent the experiences of people with prosthetic limbs. Finally, we apply the Semiotic Hierarchy model to the levels of selfhood that need to be reconstructed when incorporating a prosthetic limb, distinguishing between subjective, intersubjective, and signitive levels. We conclude that the “lowest” level concerning the body schema, agency and ownership is hardest to reconstruct, supporting arguments for the centrality of proprioception for a sense of agency and ownership.