Happy birthday Charlie

Because if he had, on February12th 2009, the sound of his smoke alarm would have steered him towards Down House kitchen, where he would have found a very large cake topped with 200 candles.

Instead, he scribbled The Origin of Species, sent it off to a publisher and kept his fingers crossed. That was in 1859. The rest, as they say, is history.

And if his scribbles are correct, Mother Nature should be examining our technological lives and applying his Sexual Evolution Theory to evolve us into living computers. Because computers are now as essential to life as curry, beer, and activities involved in the production of babies, which in rudimentary terms of food, drink and bonking, form the basic elements of his hypothesis.

Your ancestors may have evolved naturally, but you are trapped in a technology evolution. A series of ones and zeros ordered with every aspect of your life lurk inside thousands of silicon chips, everywhere on the planet. Computers run your business, entertain you and keep you alive. They are as essential to your well being as a pulse, because without them, like Darwin, you wouldn't be blowing out anymore birthday candles.

From conception, one way or another, you are inextricably linked to thousands of computers that ensure your safety for three score years and ten. They control traffic signals, aircraft flight paths and hospital instruments, to name but a few. HD TV's, USB flash drives, digital cameras, SD memory cards, mobile phones and play stations are also included as computerised saviours, because without them, we'd all die prematurely from boredom.

And when they can no longer save you, (the exchequer advises against their use in care homes) and you're encased in chipboard, with willow veneer and mock brass handles, they will see you on your way by controlling the speed of the conveyor, the curtains, and the CD playing your favourite song.

I believe Charlie was right about evolution and Mother Nature has noted this, concluding the survival of our species would be improved by evolution from flesh and blood, to flesh blood and gigabytes. And that she has begun the transition with the introduction of raw materials needed to produce computer chips in our bodies.

Gold for the circuits and connections has been used to make teeth for generations. And it's no coincidence, the main ingredient, silicon, has been surgically embedded into page three girls since the 1960's. Nowadays, enhancement is affordable by the girl next door.

Now that the essential ingredients are in place, what traits evolution will eventually give us is anyone's guess, but a good start would be a USB port in each ear and an array of memory card readers around the back of the head. You may think that compared to the power of the average human brain, an extra gigabyte or two of memory would be insignificant, but you would be wrong.

The average human brain may out-process any computer, but the information it contains can be difficult to locate - especially with old age, a hangover, or frequently both. A couple of USB flash drives as an aid memoir would be invaluable, as all the information needed for a specific task would be concentrated in one or two places. For example, when doing a crossword, or writing a book, you could plug the complete Oxford dictionary into one ear, and Roget's thesaurus into the other.

Digital photo frames would be obsolete when you can insert a camera's memory card just below your bald patch. And when you've finished the crossword, you could surf the net with a USB wireless network adapter pressed up against your cochlea. Care would be needed if driving though. You could easily get distracted and miss a red light while surfing for a map, if your homepage is linked to the Playboy website.

You're probably thinking, "this bloke's a nutter," but I defend myself by quoting Charlie's theory of Evolution by Sexual Selection, which states,

"...the frequency of traits can increase or decrease depending on the attractiveness of the bearer."

So if the bearer is unattractive, she is likely to have her 'fried eggs' enhanced with silicon. And if she flashes them at a chap with a 24 carat gold filling, nine months later, human/computer evolution may be apparent. The birth won't be a 4-gigahertz PC or Apple Mac, evolution takes time, but a first attempt might just get you a Sinclair Spectrum with limbs.

Happy 200th birthday Charlie.