Question: Why is it better to regenerate a body part instead of making an artificial one? Because if you made an artificial one then you might be able to make it stronger or improved one way or another.

Luke Williams answered on 13 Mar 2018:

Great question!

Regeneration means that you get the body to heal itself, restoring itself back to what it was. You can also think of “growing” an organ or body part, and putting that in/replacing an existing organ – which is something different. Also, as you say, you could also look at artificial body parts.

When you think of artificial body parts though – I assume you mean mechanical – something metal and plastic? Because there’s no reason why you could not make the “artificial” body part using biology – AND have that new body part stronger, or faster, or whatever.

It is technically much easier to construct a new body part, at least an arm or leg, using metals and plastics, and make them “better” than human. However, in the future, once we understand more about how biology works, and how to improve upon it, there is no reason why biology will not match the metal and plastic route.

It will eventually become the question – what does artificial mean? There is even the possibility that you could stimulate regeneration or transformation of existing body parts into stronger versions of themselves. This would likely be some form of gene therapy, where you provide instructions to your body to work slightly differently. It is also not something that is going to happen soon though, at least I do not think so.