Not Real: The Modular Body

A video which amassed over a million of views on YouTube – and over 10 million on Facebook – in its first week online shows a “human modular prototype” in which a creature was assembled using fleshy modules.

The Modular Body

“Oscar, the first human modular prototype” is featured in a viral video entitled “Presenting Oscar, The Modular Body” that was posted online in April 2016. It shows a scientist named Cornelius Vlasman assembling a strange creature from flesh modules. He first connects the computer “brain” to a heart muscle, and then connects a lung module. He continues to add to the pulsating creature, connecting a kidney and finally limbs which allow it to crawl.

The disturbing scene prompted heavy social media sharing, with many readers believing the video was real. The Modular Body, however, is simply a SciFi video. As the project’s Facebook page describes it:

THE MODULAR BODY, an online SciFi story about a near future where the body is not a closed circuit, but a modular lifeform — by Floris Kaayk

The story is told in a series of 56 videos featuring the fictional scientist engaging in a number of experiments in an attempt to create a modular life form, named Oscar. It is the work of Dutch visual artist Floris Kaayk, who told The Creator’s Project, “I thought: Why would we print an organ in exactly the same shape as the one we already have? Why wouldn’t we use this opportunity to improve it? Or even more extreme: if we can print organs and body parts, why not completely redefine and redesign the human body? That’s when I started approaching the current human body as a closed system. Difficult to repair or adapt, maybe even obsolete. An open, modular system could become immortal, and adaptable.”

Oscar’s progress can be found on a YouTube channel created for the fictional scientist, including such updates as Oscar’s Radiology Check or the Experimental Frog Leg Installation.

“Presenting Oscar, The Modular Body” had over a million views on YouTube in its first week, and over 11 million views on Facebook.