Prosthetic-denoting an artificial body part, such as a limb, or a heart implant.
The first instrument ever called a prosthetic was the big toe of an Egyptian- 3000 years ago. The next time a prosthetic would be used was 800 years later, when an iron arm was designed for a general in the roman army so that he could keep fighting. When we think prosthetics, one of two images come to mind, a pirate with a peg leg, or a sci-fi character like Robocop. The peg-leg might have been right in the early nineties, but with the progression of computers, prosthetics are coming as close to Robocop as ever. Right now, the process of bionics is what is leading prosthetics, bionics is the term of limbs that work based on automation.
Bionics has evolved the prosthetic world from being used for hiding the missing limbs in order maintain symmetry and visual appeal to making highly functional body parts that can almost replace the function of the previous ones. Prosthetics work mainly on the muscle movements of a person, for example: when the fingers move certain muscles in the upper arm also move, thus when a person loses a limb and a prosthetic replaces it the sensors in the prosthetic arm read the movement of the muscles and respond with the correct movement accordingly.
Now, through experiments and nerve surgeries it is also being made possible for prosthetics to gain the sensation of touch. This continuous evolution has drawn the interests of several organizations, and what was meant to be a way of helping amputees regain their motor abilities is now becoming gateway into the evolution of humans. Human evolution already prioritized the mind before the body centuries ago, and now through are brains we are finding ways to evolve ourselves. Bionics are now being researched on and developed by the military so that they can create the modern-day captain America. Elon musk is making the Neuralink- a brain implant meant to cure disabilities that are caused by the brain or by damage to the brain, disabilities such as blindness or quadriplegia. Neuralink desires to become a computer inside the brain that will inevitably make us superhuman and reduce the danger of AI becoming superior to us- a fear that Musk has shared with the world multiple times.
The fact of the matter is that bionics has the potential of taking human evolution to the point where we might start preferring machines as our bodies more than the real thing, a bionic hand might be amazing for sports and bionic legs have already been used for running and rock climbing and if this field is taken to its apex maybe prosthetics will become the preference.