VIDEO: People with Superpowers Caught on Camera!

Here’s some footage of people with alleged superpowers caught on tape. What do you think? Could those be real-life superheroes or are they just ordinary humans with really good tricks? Either way, superpowers have always made great subjects for SF art.

Here are a few details about superhumans in science fiction, provided by Wikipedia.

The concept of the superhuman is quite popular in science fiction, where superhumans are often cyborgs, mutants, aliens, telepaths, the product of ongoing human evolution or genetically engineered. The greatest publicity for the concept are comic book superheroes, such as Superman (an alien). The term is often used in discussions of comic book characters because of the considerable overlap between superheroes and superhumans is such that the archetypical comic book revolves around superhuman characters who become super heroes or super villains. However, many comic books outside of DC and Marvel rely on alternative terminology for both because the terms Superman and “Super Hero” (not the generic “superhero”) are registered as trademarks. Superhuman characters in various comics, role-playing games and other entertainment media have also been referred to as a metahuman, mutant, evolved human or superhuman, or posthuman.

One type of superhuman described in science fiction stories, particularly during the Atomic Age, derives from the concept of mutation or further human evolution. In such tales, a human would evolve into or give birth to a being that either has powers not yet exhibited by ‘baseline’ humans, or else motivations entirely different from those humans, or both. In some stories, these humans are either unable to get along with “normal” humanity, or will ultimately supersede them entirely, causing the eventual extinction of the descendants of contemporary baseline humanity.

These metahumans are designated as a “new species” (or “successor species”) of humanity. In some fictional franchises, such as those of The Tomorrow People, Babylon 5 or the X-Men, they refer to themselves through use of the binomial nomenclature Homo superior, to distinguish them from Homo sapiens. Progress is inherently built into this science fiction subgenre, as it is assumed that they are the natural product of ongoing evolutionary adaptation to a new environment.

However, other stories turn this notion on its head, showing the disadvantages of a supposedly superior ability or quality; for example, the mutants of the X-Men are depicted as being unable to control their own powers, resulting in significant damage and catastrophe when their powers first activate. They must undergo rigorous training to make practical use of their powers and to coexist among others. In Briar Patch by Dean Ing, a group of ancient hominids were portrayed as a largely pacifistic, telepathic and highly empathic species who could not stand to inflict pain, even while hunting; they were eventually overwhelmed and exterminated by the less sensitive but more ruthless Homo sapiens.

Indeed, fear, persecution and interspecies ‘racism’ from non-metahuman humanity is a problem in the fictional universes of The Tomorrow People, X-Men and Babylon 5 alike. Military exploitation and abuse of telepaths, anti-mutant Sentinel technology and the repressive tolerance of Psi Corps in the latter universe parallels real-world versions of prejudice and discrimination.

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