70% of Australians are cyborgs.

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Haraway (as cited in Kuttainen, 2016), defines the cyborg as being a hybrid of machine and organism – man and machine – and goes on to argue that the cyborg is no longer constrained to fiction, but is in fact a creature of social reality.  The question of whether or not cyborgs do in fact exist, as Haraway suggests is the case, can be solved by proving or disproving that humans have blended with technology.  

Zephoria (2016) reports that the average user spends 50 minutes a day on Facebook; Heber (2015) state that Australians spend closer to 1.7 hours a day.  While those quantities of time are significant in their own right, they don’t take into account the fact that users are always connected to Facebook, even when they are not accessing it.  As Lessin noted (as cited in McNeill, 2012), “Now, you and your friends will finally be able to tell all the different parts of your story—from the small things you do each day to your biggest moments.” This networked identity quickly merges with your real identity.  As Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg proclaimed (as cited in McNeill, 2012), “you can’t be on Facebook without being your authentic self.”  For example, let’s say you were to have a big night on the town with some friends.  During that time, you do not access Facebook.  However, your friends are tagging you at every bar you go to, taking photos of you, uploading them and tagging you in them.  While you are still sleeping off your hangover on Sunday morning, your less exciting friends are waking up to these images, discussing them, and forming fresh opinions of you based on them. 

It is clear then that our connections to Facebook are constant and permanent, indicating that those active users have in fact blended with technology.  If Heber’s (2015) estimates that 13 million Australians – roughly 70% of the nation’s adult population – are active on Facebook each month, then we have truly become a nation of cyborgs.

References
Heber, A. (2015). These Incredible Stats Show Exactly How Huge Facebook Is In Australia.  Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com.au/these-incredible-stats-show-exactly-how-huge-facebook-is-in-australia-2015-4
Kuttainen, V. (2016).  BA1002:  Our Space: Networks, Narrative and the Making of Place, week 6 notes [Powerpoint slides].  Retrieved from https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/
McNeill, L. (2012). There Is No "I" in Network: Social Networking Sites and Posthuman Auto/Biography. Biography 35(1), 65-82.

Zephoria. (2016). The Top 20 Valuable Facebook Statistics.  Retrieved from https://zephoria.com/top-15-valuable-facebook-statistics/