If the face of the future is the cyber world, then our remarkable ability to recognise human faces is already being pitted against it. Real time face-recognition software is becoming more and more sophisticated. In time, computers will recognise faces at ATM machines, pick out potential terrorists in airport lounges and identify who it is that broke into your computer in the office. We'll see prototypes already on trial. In our lifetimes we may even witness the creation of artificial faces so lifelike we'll be unable to distinguish between our own face and a computer replicate.
Computer faces so trustworthy, they'll replace human counsellors.
In the twentieth century, we're obsessed with faces. Cosmetic surgeons have already got the repair business down to a fine art. We'll witness a face distorted by a genetic defect totally re-built, bones and all. It's confronting viewing, but you'll never take a face for granted again.