NARRATOR: Sacred tattoos.
These are primeval symbols that speak to something in us
that’s very deep-seated and very universal.
NARRATOR: Severe body modifications.
BILL BIRNES: The tribespeople
sharpen the edges of their teeth
to look like serpents.
NARRATOR: Extreme adornments.
JONATHAN YOUNG: Girls in the Kayan culture stretched out their necks
with brass rings to emulate their sacred ancestor.
NARRATOR: Could these metamorphic alterations of the flesh
represent more than mere self-expression
or even acts of religious tribute?
Might they contain a message
critical to the future of mankind?
GIORGIO A. TSOUKALOS: The reason why they did this to their bodies
is in order to gain the strength of the gods
that they tried to imitate.
WILLIAM HENRY: We now have technology
that is equal to what we see
the gods using in these ancient stories.
Maybe now we’re gonna be able to turn ourselves into a species
just like the gods.
NARRATOR: There is a doorway
in the universe.
Beyond it is the promise of truth.
It demands we question everything
we have ever been taught.
The evidence is all around us.
The future is right before our eyes.
We are not alone.
We have never been alone.
Tattooed and pierced Italian fashion model
Cristian Mignemi makes a bold and permanent decision
to transform the sclera, or whites of his eyes,
into black.
He claims he wants to appear more otherworldly.
Cristian Mignemi
is a very forward-thinking person in fashion,
by choosing to go to the extreme
of coloring his eyes completely black,
looking almost alien-like.
This is a trend happening across the board.
Body modifications,
tattooing, piercing,
all types of adornments to change
the physical appearance of our bodies.
It’s almost as if humanity, in a fashion sense,
is gearing themselves to look more alien.
MITCH HOROWITZ: People feel liberated
by the idea that they can appear
extrahuman in some way.
They can look like something extraterrestrial
or they can look like something primeval.
There’s something self-dramatizing
and empowering about it.
NARRATOR: Today, tattoos and piercings
account for a nearly $1 billion industry.
Trending modification practices
like ear elongation and branding the skin
are all on the rise.
But what could motivate someone to alter their body
in such a way?
The way we adorn our bodies
is essentially telling a story and sending messages.
The fact that more and more people
are expressing themselves through body art,
it tells a bigger story on a cultural level.
Now that we’re so connected through the Internet,
it’s easy to find inspiration from others
and what other people are doing in body art practices.
Symbols communicate things
that we’re not quite able to put into words.
It goes beyond just wanting to make a statement
about one’s individuality.
It demonstrates what you believe in.
NARRATOR: While tattoos, piercings
and body modification
are modern forms of personal expression,
they also hearken back to humanity’s ancient past
and mirror the practices
of many so-called primitive tribes that exist
around the world today.
A lot of what we do finds inspiration
in ancient roots from all over the world.
These are things that we’ve seen on, say,
like, National Geographic
and books and on TV over the years.
And they’ve inspired newer forms
of body modification and body art expression.
NARRATOR: Rites of passage,
like skin stretching,
have been seen throughout history
in different parts of the world.
The revered Buddha,
the Dayak of Borneo,
the ancient Rapa Nui of Easter Island
and the modern Fulani tribe of West Africa
all have colorful histories of ritual ear stretching.
The contemporary Mursi women of Ethiopia,
tribes of the Amazon
and the earlier Botocudo people of coastal Brazil
all share a history of skin stretching
for decorative lip plates.
But are these practices being adopted by mainstream society
simply as a fashion trend,
a bold form of self-expression?
Or could it be motivated by a profound link
to our ancient past?
TSOUKALOS: When people have tattoos,
it’s something meaningful.
And so my question is not, today,
why do we tattoo ourselves?
I ask the question,
when did we first tattoo ourselves, and then why?
NARRATOR: September 9, 1991.
11,000 feet high in the Otztal Alps.
Two German climbers near the Austrian-Italian border
happen upon a frozen corpse.
Scientists call him the Tyrolean Iceman, or Otzi,
and place his time of death
between 3400 and 3100 BC.
What we find so amazing about Otzi,
he’s very well preserved.
So well preserved
that scientists and anthropologists can even tell
that he had a lot of medical conditions.
And that leads us to Otzi’s tattoos.
NARRATOR: In 2015,
more than two decades after the initial discovery,
scientists were able to make a more detailed scan
of the Iceman’s epidermis.
The results were extraordinary.
ANDREW COLLINS: Under examination,
it was found that Otzi the Iceman
had, in fact, 61 different tattoos over his body,
and almost all of these took the form of parallel lines,
either two together, three together.
In one case, seven together.
BARRETTA: These tattoos, it’s amazing.
They are actually located on acupuncture points
throughout the body.
Most of them are on the joints, the lower back,
the thoracic area, the chest.
And what that tells us is he had some knowledge of healing.
NARRATOR: Acupuncture is a traditional form of Chinese medicine
involving the pricking of the skin with needles
along the body’s neurohormonal meridians
to alleviate pain and treat various medical conditions.
Traditional historians place the origin of acupuncture in China
at approximately 100 BC.
Acupuncture did not exist as a formal system
of therapeutic treatment in China, uh,
at the time that Otzi received his tattoos
on the other side of the globe.
HENRY: So, where did Otzi get these tattoos
that were made with the knowledge
of acupuncture points on the body?
DAVID CHILDRESS: We think acupuncture’s from China,
but here’s something even older and from the Alps.
CAROLINE CORY: The fact that we find these tattoos
at specific meridian points tells us
that this civilization knew
of the meridians in the body,
understood how energy runs in the body,
which is quite an advanced process for that time.
So, where did this knowledge come from?
Is it possible that it came
from some kind of higher source,
downloaded into the healers of the time?
Is it possible that acupuncture
is really coming from extraterrestrials?
NARRATOR: Could the Tyrolean Iceman
point to the possibility that tattooing originated
as a result of contact with extraterrestrial visitors?
While it may sound far-fetched,
ancient astronaut theorists suggest
that some of the most popular tattoos
found in both the ancient and modern world
contain symbolism connected to the cosmos.
HOROWITZ: Some of the earliest yearnings
of our ancient ancestors
was to recognize and connect themselves
to the cosmos, to the movement of celestial objects,
to the cycles of the seasons.
In modern tattoo art,
we’re not only seeing a proliferation
of celestial images,
whether the Sun, the stars,
the phases of the Moon, astrological symbols,
but we’re also starting to see E.T. images.
These are primeval symbols that speak to something in us
that’s very deep-seated and very universal.
Tattooing or body modification can be a way
of remembering one’s ancestors,
remembering one’s connection with the cosmos.
NARRATOR: A yearning to connect with the cosmos
is perhaps as old as civilization itself.
And ancient astronaut theorists suggest
that tattoos represent far more than merely
a symbolic representation of this.
They believe that the desire to alter the flesh
through tattooing and other means
may be embedded deep in the subconscious mind
and that perhaps the origin of this human need
can be found encoded in the well-preserved skin
of Egypt’s mummies.
NARRATOR: Deir El-Medina, Egypt.
2014.
Using modern imaging equipment,
Dr. Anne Austin scans the body of a female mummy
dating back as far as 1300 BC.
What she finds is unexpected
and contradicts long-held beliefs
regarding female roles in ancient Egyptian society.
One particular torso was a human female
who had the image of Hathor tattooed onto her body.
In ancient Egypt,
having the tattoo of Hathor on your body
would clearly be an indication
of your status as a priestess of Hathor
and as a person who’s not just a representative of Hathor
but maybe in direct contact with the goddess, as well.
BARRETTA: Prior to finding these mummies,
it was believed that women in Egypt
were only tattooed if they were prostitutes or dancers.
We see that, no,
these were most likely, you know, priestesses.
The tattoos relate to a deity,
to a sky god, Hathor.
The symbol for Hathor would sometimes be
the head of a cow, horns, a disc in the center.
The Egyptian tattoos are very symbolic
of their close association with the cosmos.
They were very in tune with their gods.
They felt, through these symbols,
they were communicating with the gods.
NARRATOR: The Egyptian goddess Hathor
is an earlier incarnation of Isis,
considered the primeval goddess
from whom all others were derived.
In the Temple of Hathor in Dendera,
the goddess is depicted sailing in a ship of eternity
along the night waters...
not of the Nile but of the Milky Way.
TSOUKALOS: Dendera is one of the most important
ancient Egyptian sites.
It clearly depicts travel through the sky
with the so-called sun barges.
And our ancestors knew that ships do not fly
across the sky or across the Sun.
So why would they describe barges
that came down from the sky?
What is depicted in Dendera are the extraterrestrials
as they’re traveling across the sky.
NARRATOR: Is it possible
that the mummy found at Deir El-Medina was tattooed
with symbols representing extraterrestrial visitors
to Earth?
TSOUKALOS: My idea is
that the ancient Egyptians worshipped those symbols
because not only did they have to illustrate
that they were of the ruling class
but also that they had a direct connection,
or so they thought,
to Hathor.
The reason why they put that on their bodies
is in order to gain
the strength of the gods that they tried to imitate.
And these gods were
flesh-and-blood extraterrestrials.
NARRATOR: Do the tattoos
found on the mummies at Deir El-Medina
reveal attempts to connect with the power of a god
or an extraterrestrial being?
And did the ancient Egyptians permanently mark their flesh
in order to honor divine beings
or leave a lasting commemoration
of contact with otherworldly visitors?
HOROWITZ: Humanity has always used
symbols and sigils and cryptography
to convey messages.
BARRETTA: The Egyptians realized
there was a lot of power in symbols,
and they knew how to use these symbols
when they would tattoo.
We have to wonder, was it to communicate
with the gods through their tattoos?
To emulate the gods?
To embody the gods?
NARRATOR: The cow and disc representing Hathor
was not the only tattoo discovered on the mummies
at Deir El-Medina.
One of the bodies also bore another powerful symbol.
BARRETTA: She had the Eye of Horus.
And they say the Eye of Horus is composed of six parts
which relate to our six senses.
Not the five we think we have. We have six.
Sight, hearing, smell,
taste, touch and thought.
But what is thought? Is that extrasensory thought?
Is that the way we communicate nonverbally?
So, the Eye of Horus
also has a very magical type of element to it.
HOROWITZ: The all-seeing eye or the Eye of Horus
as it was depicted in ancient Egypt
was one of the holiest of symbols.
It served to remind the individual
that human life is incomplete
without some sort of higher vision
or without the awareness of providence of a higher world.
That was a central idea, uh, to the ancient Egyptians.
CHILDRESS: The Eye of Horus
is the eye of God that sees everything.
We’re talking about an Egyptian god
who’s quite possibly an extraterrestrial.
NARRATOR: Many of the symbols found
on ancient mummies, like the Eye of Horus,
have been used as tattoo designs for centuries
and are still popular with tattoo enthusiasts today.
But why do they endure?
Is it possible that a simple but iconic image
of an eye devised more than 3,000 years ago
still speaks to humans today
because we intuitively understand the power behind it?
HOROWITZ: People adorn themselves
with bodily art, tattoos or body modification
without knowing why that pentagram
or why that obelisk or why that pyramid
speaks so deeply to them.
If you ask them,
they might not be able to give you a very clear answer,
but their experience of that symbol is answer enough.
It inspires awe.
It tells us that we come from something larger.
NARRATOR: Could the tattoos of our ancestors
contain a record of humanity’s past
and messages meant for us to decode today?
Perhaps the answer can be found by examining not just tattoos
but far more extreme body modifications.
NARRATOR: Tanna Island.
Every year on February 15,
residents of the Pacific island chain of Vanuatu
gather together here for a military-style parade
with "U.S.A." painted
and sometimes even tattooed on their chests.
It is a tradition that began more than 60 years ago
and is inspired by events
that took place during World War II,
when American forces descended upon the remote island chain
with modern machinery and supplies.
During the Second World War,
when the Americans reached the Pacific,
um, and took over many of the islands,
supplies would be dropped from aircraft
or brought in on landing strips.
And this brought many new things
to these local populations,
everything from canned foods
to manufactured clothing
to other items they’d never seen before.
NARRATOR: The native people, who had never encountered
this type of modern civilization,
were awed by these visitors from the sky,
who brang with them food and gifts.
All the aboriginals were fascinated.
They’d light up a cigarette.
Hold out a voice recorder, record their voice.
The aboriginals thought this was all magic.
YOUNG: They had never seen great ships
and the goods, the-the weapons.
Arthur C. Clarke’s third law is:
"Any sufficiently advanced technology
is indistinguishable from magic."
NARRATOR: After the war in the Pacific concluded,
the U.S. soldiers left the islands, and overnight,
the bounty of technology and modern luxuries was gone.
In memory of the American soldiers
and in the hope that it would bring about their return,
the natives formed a cult devoted to the people
who had visited them from the sky.
The people would try and recreate
the circumstances that brought this cargo to them.
They started to create replica items
associated with the Americans and their presence,
even rifles.
MARTELL: They would scrape away runways
and make straw models of the planes that landed
to try and lure the soldiers
to once again land and bring all their amazing technology.
Every religious experience begins with the miraculous.
Some individual or group
will have an experience where they feel
they have witnessed something or undergone something
that is outside of the ordinary.
And they will create
monuments to that experience,
whether it is the statue of a deity,
whether it is a pyramid, whether it is a cathedral.
We see this across history
and all over the world to this very day.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that,
much like the so-called cargo cults
in the South Pacific,
ancient people also constructed monuments
and even entire religions
based on interactions with visitors from the sky?
MARTELL: The term "cargo cult" is very interesting
when applied to the ancient astronaut theory,
because we can see that even in modern times
how man has interacted with things coming from the sky
or other technology they didn’t understand.
This has been playing out for thousands of years
here on Earth.
NARRATOR: If extraterrestrial visitation
inspired the ancient people
to build temples in a certain fashion
and attempt to reproduce misunderstood technology,
could it also have motivated them
to tattoo and otherwise modify their bodies
similar to how the people of Vanuatu adorn their chests
with the letters "U.S.A.,"
continuing to imitate the soldiers who visited
before most of the islanders were even born?
Ancient astronaut theorists suggest
additional evidence that cargo cult practices
include body modifications
can be found by examining numerous other cultures
throughout the world that also undergo
extreme body alterations.
♪ ♪
In Brazil, the Kayapo worship a god they call Bep Kororoti,
who they depict in ceremonies with a straw suit
that is eerily reminiscent of a modern-day spacesuit.
Their traditions include intricate body painting,
face tattooing, lip stretching and peculiar haircuts,
all to harness the power of this otherworldly being.
And perhaps the most extreme body modification of all
is practiced by the Kayan people of Burma.
COLLINS: There is a tradition
amongst the Kayan people
of the women wearing
these spiraling brass rings in their neck.
And they wear these throughout their life,
and it can take many, many hours
to actually put these coils in place.
There is a tradition that this female dragon
had begun the dynasty of the Kayan people,
and that the reason they do this is to resemble this dragon.
STEAVU: In Kayan foundational mythology,
dragons play a very prominent role,
that act as messengers between the world
of the divine and the world of humans.
They are very powerful, magical creatures as well,
and they’re associated with ultimate knowledge.
Is it possible that this creature
actually came from the sky world
and was seen to be the influence
behind the foundation of these people,
a memory which they never forgot?
NARRATOR: Could it be that there are cultures
around the world today
keeping alive an ancient story
of alien visitation by altering their flesh?
And is it possible that the growing trend
of body modification in the modern world
is due to a deep-seated memory
of our extraterrestrial origins?
Perhaps further clues can be found by examining
one of the most peculiar practices
of the ancient world: head binding.
NARRATOR: Viacha, Bolivia.
November 2018.
Just 30 miles east
of the mysterious ancient site of Puma Punku,
archeologists uncover 500-year-old tombs
believed to have been built by a pre-Incan civilization
called the Pacajes.
The remains of more than 100 people are discovered within,
and a number of the skulls
are found to have a very bizarre abnormality.
They appear dramatically elongated.
According to archeologists,
these specimens display evidence
of a body modification practice called head binding.
The head can be changed in its shape.
Generally, it’s elongated.
And this is done when a child is perhaps six months old
through to the age of three.
And their heads are bound up,
and this pushes the skull upwards
and creates these bizarre shapes.
Just by gazing upon them,
you can’t help think alien,
because that’s what they truly look like.
NARRATOR: Curiously, this extreme form of body modification
was widespread throughout the ancient world,
occurring on nearly every continent
and practiced by many cultures that are believed to have had
no contact with one another.
This is a process that has been going on
at least for the last 10,000 years
and is found in every part of the world,
from the Pacific islands to Australia,
to the Near East, to the Americas.
And the strangest are those of Paracas in Peru.
Everywhere, we find this same process.
It seems as if it was mimicking people
who originally existed
that had long heads in the first place.
CHILDRESS: In Vanuatu, anthropologists asked
the people who were still doing head binding up until the 1960s,
and they asked them why they did that, and they said,
"This is what the gods look like with these elongated heads."
And if that is the explanation for head binding
around the world, then who are these gods?
They’re apparently extraterrestrials
who have a naturally elongated head
that’s just part of their DNA,
and humans want to look like them.
NARRATOR: If ancient people did encounter extraterrestrials
and perhaps even coexisted with them,
might there have been something more profound at play
than mere deification and imitation?
Some ancient astronaut theorists believe
that it may, in fact, be programmed into human DNA
to want to become more like our alien ancestors.
And that ancient traditions
of body modification and tattooing
represent practice runs,
preparing for the day when we could alter ourselves
to actually become like the aliens.
Vancouver, British Columbia.
August 13, 2019.
Ancient astronaut theorist William Henry
visits self-described transhumanist Russ Foxx...
-Yeah, he’s in his room right there. -Oh, thank you.
NARRATOR: ...to get a firsthand look at technology
that proposes to transform the human race.
-FOXX: Hi, William. -Hi. How are you?
I’m William Henry. Pleasure to meet you.
Good to meet you. Grab a seat.
-Thank you very much. -This is Eric.
-Hi, Eric. How are you? -Hi. Nice to meet you.
Pleasure to meet you as well.
NARRATOR: In his 2015 book,
The Skingularity Is Near,
William Henry proposed
that humankind is reaching a point
where the body will be radically transformed.
Well, you came at a perfect time... Eric is going to
have an NFC chip installed today.
Fantastic.
I will begin by cleaning your hand.
NARRATOR: He is eager to investigate
how this is already beginning to happen.
Russ prepares to implant Eric
with a biocompatible glass tube...
FOXX: So we are ready to install the chip.
NARRATOR: ...containing an NFC microchip.
FOXX: So the implant itself was pre-sterilized
and loaded into a syringe, so it will be
literally injected under the skin.
You now have a chip.
NARRATOR: NFC stands for "near-field communication,"
and it allows phones, tablets, laptops and other devices
to easily share data with other NFC-equipped devices.
So, Russ, what-what technologies have you got implanted?
I personally have a number of different chips
in both of my hands, as well as a magnetic vision implant,
an RFID and an NFC in either side
-with different purposes. -Mm-hmm.
This NFC chip has all of my business links and web URLs.
And this is a built-in business card.
So I can actually scan it with your phone
and give you my contact info.
Just like that, and it brings up my contact info
-and saves it in your phone. -Wow.
Look at that. So I’ve got your phone number.
I’ve got your contact details.
So, all of these things,
you use it to start your motorcycle,
get in your home...
I replaced my keys with these chips,
so that way, I don’t have to deal
with losing or having keys stolen.
So these chips interact with a lot
of different devices in my life.
I could bring you to my house and show you some of them.
-I’d love that. -Let’s go for a trip.
-Right on. -Okay.
HENRY: Humanity has a long history of interaction
with extraterrestrial beings who came here with technology.
And humans have long tried
to imitate or be like the gods.
So I will wake up the bike with my RFID chip.
-I introduce it to the sensor. -HENRY: Okay.
FOXX: And the bike is awake.
-Awesome. Okay. -Just like that.
HENRY: And now today,
we have transhuman technology
where we’re augmenting the physical body
in an effort to duplicate many of the capacities
that we attribute to the ancient gods.
♪ ♪
So, to access my home,
-I scan my chip... -Ah.
-...and the door’s unlocked. We can enter. -Very nice.
-After you. -Thank you.
HENRY: What I’m hoping to see here
by coming to Russ’s home is to see the future.
Where is Russ going to go with this?
What has he got access to in his own home,
and-and how is that gonna change him?
-So this is my dining room table. -Okay.
Which doubles as an RFID-operated safe.
-Ah. -What I do is I scan
my RFID chip on top.
A slip hinge... and there’s my drawer.
Ah, very nice. Beautiful.
So these devices in here
-are implantable technology pieces I have. -Mm-hmm.
-And I will show you what they are. -Fantastic.
So, this first device, this is called a North Sense.
This device is mounted to the body with piercings.
This device will vibrate
whenever it faces magnetic north,
essentially turning you into a human compass.
And here we have some magnet implants.
So, this is a small chip that encases tritium gas,
and it will glow right through your skin.
And because it is, uh, radioactive material,
it’s not, um, battery powered.
It will constantly glow, and it has
-a 12-year half-life. -Wow.
At what point do we become more than human
in the transhuman process?
I think that we’re-we’re always
going to be building on to our existing humanity,
but it’s important to appreciate our existing humanity.
We don’t want to lose touch with that.
HENRY: When I look at Russ, I see someone
who’s on the cutting edge of our technology,
but he’s just the beginning
of where we potentially can go with this.
We’re talking about transforming humans into super beings.
NARRATOR: With the emergence of technology
that can be implanted within the flesh,
is humankind on the brink of possessing abilities
similar to those described by ancient people
in reference to their gods?
Has body modification
all been a preparation for this evolution?
Perhaps further clues can be found
by examining plans to merge tattoos with technology.
NARRATOR: Boulder, Colorado.
2018.
At the University of Colorado,
Dr. Carson Bruns and a team of scientists
begins work on developing a new technology
that promises to transform what it means to get ink...
"smart tattoos."
BRUNS: We’re trying to engineer new tattoo inks
that will add new function to your skin.
The first one that we invented is a UV-sensitive tattoo ink.
It’s basically invisible under normal lighting conditions,
but when you go outside in intense sunshine
and it gets exposed to the UV lights...
that high-energy part of sunshine
that causes skin cancer and sunburn...
it turns blue and acts like an indicator
that shows you that your skin is dangerously exposed
to high levels of dangerous radiation.
NARRATOR: Dr. Bruns has also created tattoo inks
that change color as the body’s temperature changes,
essentially creating a human onboard thermometer
accessible at any time.
BRUNS: We can use nanotechnology
to engineer tattoo particles
so that they have special properties,
like a thermal battery
or a thermal storage type of mechanism.
And so one thing that you can imagine doing with a tattoo
would be covering your entire body
with a sort of thermal storage material
that would keep your body at a comfortable temperature
when you went out into the extreme heat
or the extreme cold.
NARRATOR: Smart tattoos are even being engineered
to monitor and treat health conditions.
BRUNS: If we have a chronic condition
that needs drugs, we can envision a tattoo ink
that slowly releases a drug or a hormone
into your body that helps regulate
either your blood chemistry or your mood.
I also envision tattoos that can really strengthen our skin,
make our skin stronger to forces and-and damage.
The military may have a lot of use for full-body tattoos
that can help protect soldiers, for example,
from certain types of skin damage.
HENRY: Carson Bruns is doing fascinating work
on the human skin.
He believes that we can change the nature of skin altogether,
using skin as a new platform for technological development.
Humans have always tried to imitate the gods,
and perhaps tattoos are a reflection of this.
In ancient times,
they might have seen the gods wearing something like tattoos,
and they started tattooing their own bodies
in imitation of what the gods were wearing.
But today, we now have technology that is equal
to what we see the gods using in these ancient stories.
Maybe now we’re going to be able to turn ourselves into
a species just like the gods.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that ancient people
came into contact with more advanced beings
that had smart tattoos
much like those that are being developed today?
Could these otherworldly visitors
have had technology hidden within their skin,
appearing as artwork?
Conducting tattoos that we’re working on are black right now,
so it looks like an ordinary black tattoo pigment.
But you could even merge the technology
with the art so that you could have
a tattoo that looks like a normal artistic tattoo
but has this hidden function
as some kind of electronic or detecting device.
NARRATOR: As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned,
with such technology,
extraterrestrials could truly have appeared
to be gods to ancient people.
And they believe humanity is very close
to becoming like these alien ancestors.
Silicon Valley.
2018.
Futurist Elon Musk introduces a new technology venture
aimed at what is known as "self-directed evolution."
He calls it "Neuralink."
By means of a special hypodermic needle,
the company intends to inject an ultra thin mesh,
called a "neuro lace," within the neocortex,
forming a body of electrodes
that are able to monitor brain function.
A neural lace uses microelectrodes
they place inside of the brain
that can actually read and write onto neurons.
It’s a bidirectional informational exchange.
And it eventually will allow you
to receive information from the Internet.
FOXX: Through the use of Neuralinking,
we can connect brains
through the Internet or through technology.
When this is the case, we can send thoughts to one another.
BRUNS: Another thing you could do,
if you were able to read brain activity,
would be to control devices remotely with your mind.
So, it would give us telekinesis in principle, as well.
NARRATOR: The technology
that Elon Musk is developing
could potentially also be applied to the human body
in the form of tattoos.
Nanotechnology is allowing us to make electronics small enough
so when tattooable electronics come online,
you can do things like a scalp tattoo.
If we’re able to read brain activity
from this sort of seamless and permanent interface in our skin,
you could imagine a new form of communication,
almost sort of a technological telepathy.
NARRATOR: Is humanity nearing a time
when we will no longer be a cargo cult...
unknowingly mimicking a far more advanced civilization
that once visited Earth... but will, in fact,
become just like these extraterrestrial visitors?
Have we evolved from imitation to replication?
Perhaps further clues can be found
by examining new developments in body modification
designed to facilitate space travel.
ATOR: In the 21st century,
tattoos and body modifications are no longer fringe
and no longer merely decorative.
Technology implanted within the flesh
can facilitate superhuman abilities.
But of greatest interest to ancient astronaut theorists
is the role that smart tattoos could potentially play
in space travel.
BRUNS: The next generation of space suits
are gonna be embedded with a lot more technologies,
and it’s possible to make tattoos
that can interact with the space suit.
You can imagine even a space suit
that would be able to read out information
that those tattoos are providing
and send them back to mission control.
NARRATOR: Scientists are even beginning to develop technology
that could make space suits obsolete.
We can use nanotechnology to engineer tattoo particles
so that they have special properties
covering your entire body.
Super skin, E-skin, I-skin is
skin that is enhanced or laced with technology.
Since 2002, the U.S. military has been very interested
in creating a new skin for the military.
This augmentation will transform us from humans
into the next level of evolution,
augmenting the body
to make us smarter, to make us stronger.
BRUNS: We’re gonna keep improving the technologies,
and we’re gonna keep embedding them
more and more intimately with our bodies
to improve our abilities as humans
and ultimately give us more power.
NARRATOR: But if the first humans to apply tattoos to their flesh
and perform other body modifications,
such as head binding, were attempting
to imitate extraterrestrials,
are the technological enhancements
we’re making to our bodies today part of our destiny?
And if so, where does it lead?
HENRY: Through nanotechnology,
we can augment the skin to make it more adaptable
to living in space.
To make us smarter, to make us stronger,
to make us more resilient.
We’re able to become like the gods
through the implantation of this technology.
BARRETTA: When you take it right back to its roots,
tattooing is very transformative
and has a lot of roots in what we would call magic.
And our ancient ancestors were very much
in tune with the cosmos.
And what we’re doing right now, we’re bringing this back
to the magical modality that it is.
This adornment now...
is this making us more extraterrestrial-like?
SCOTT: Any advanced alien species
that makes it across the galaxy
is going to have learned how to self-direct their evolution.
We are augmenting our bodies
and moving forward with our evolution.
NARRATOR: Is there a message about humanity’s future
encoded in our very flesh and our attempts to alter it?
Could it be that tattoos, piercings
and body modifications are inspired
by extraterrestrial visitors from the past?
Perhaps we are just now arriving at a destiny
that has been foretold through human hieroglyphs.
One in which we will become the equals
of our alien ancestors.