In biology, moulting is the process by which many species of animal shed a part of their bodies, often an external layer of skin or fur or feathers or, as with arthropods, an entire exoskeleton. This can happen annually at specific times of year, or over the course of an animal’s life cycle. Humans do not naturally moult, although not for lack of trying. Loofah sponges and pumice stones, exfoliating face scrubs, micro-derma rollers, chemical peels: we have invented all manner of products and processes to slough off our dead skin cells and attempt, however momentarily, to cheat time. And to the extent that, as human animals, we are now evolving along with our technologies, it might be that we eventually do away with the need for bodies altogether, uploading our consciousness to a computer in a version of what theorists of superintelligence call “the singularity.”
At the end of...