For the past 20 years, Erik Sprague has been turning himself into a lizard. Alex Smith has various magnets and microchips inserted under his skin and Brian McEvoy is working on a miniature compass that will be embedded into his body. Amanda Smith takes a look at the world of freaks, ‘biohackers’ and radical body modification.

Erik Sprague travels the world performing traditional sideshow acts. He swallows swords, breathes fire, inserts a corkscrew up his nose and sticks spikes into his flesh. He also looks like a lizard.

'I have spent over 700 hours being completely tattooed from head to toe with green reptilian scales and black markings,’ he says. ‘I've also had sub-dermal Teflon implants on my skull over my eyes to create horned ridges. My teeth have been filed into points via a dentist drill, and my tongue bifurcated, split in two like that of a snake, using an argon laser.'

He also has the word ‘freak’ tattooed across his chest in capital letters. It's a word that few people would want applied to them, but the Lizardman is happy to claim it.

'It takes something very special to be a freak, and in my case it's taken a lot of blood and a lot of time and a lot of pain to do it,’ he says. ‘To me it's a badge of honour. I waited a long time to have it tattooed on my chest before I felt that I'd actually earned that honour.'

It's a fun party trick, but the main reason I have it is that it lets me sense magnetic fields. Appliances—microwaves, washing machines, TVs—output electromagnetic waves. They are invisible to most people, and throughout our homes we don't know they're there. With this implant I can feel those waves. Alex Smith, biohacker

Sprague's metamorphosis into the Lizardman sounds Kafka-esque, but it was the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein who influenced him.

'My transformation project, as I initially called it, was based on ideas that came from linguistic philosophy; specifically looking at the word “human being” and how it was applied as a term. I used Wittgenstein's family resemblance to show that you could separate yourself from resembling the other things that get the term but still have the term be applicable to you.’

Applying this concept transformed Sprague from a performance artist who used costuming and installations into a body artist. Hence the radical and permanent modifications he’s undergone. Playing with his appearance raises the question of what exactly constitutes a human being.

While Sprague is clearly still human, he's most certainly not ordinary-looking. With his bifurcated tongue, pointy teeth, green tattooed skin and ridged forehead, he can never go unnoticed. He says he’s often accused of being an attention seeker.

‘[It] is a very strange criticism because it seems to me that all human beings want attention at some point in time. I really only want attention when I'm performing. When I'm grocery shopping I'm trying to blend in, not that I can, but the thing is that I'm not out there going, "Hey, look at me, look at me, look at me!" I only do that on stage.

‘There's nothing wrong with wanting attention, the problem is if you go out seeking people's attention and then you don't do anything with it.’

Like Sprague, 'biohackers' are also into extreme body modification, but you might not be able to see it. Biohackers are technology enthusiasts interested in enhancing their human abilities by inserting microchips and magnets into themselves.

'I've always been into science fiction and I'm not satisfied with being just human,’ says Alex Smith, a computer programmer with a number of implants. ‘I want to be something more.'

Inserted between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand are two RFID chips. One unlocks his phone when he holds it near his hand. The other has his medical information stored on it.

'Most hospitals today aren't equipped to read that kind of information, but in the future you will go into hospital and they'll read the chip in your hand and know all of your history,’ he says.

Related: Taking body modification to the extreme

Smith also has a chip in his forearm that allows him to read his internal temperature and a magnet in his ring finger. He can use the magnet to physically pick up small metal objects such as paper clips and safety pins.

'It's a fun party trick, but the main reason I have it is that it lets me sense magnetic fields,’ Smith says. ‘Appliances—microwaves, washing machines, TVs—output electromagnetic waves. They are invisible to most people, and throughout our homes we don't know they're there. With this implant I can feel those waves.’

Why would anyone want to sense electromagnetic fields? Smith says it's like having a sixth sense: 'Why wouldn't you want to be able to smell or see? Why wouldn't you want to be able to sense these other phenomena in the world around you?'

All but one of Smith's implants was inserted by a body modification artist at a tattoo and piercing salon. Biohackers tend not to consult surgeons or other medical professionals.

'I put in one of the RFID chips; they’re quite easy to implant because they're small and they can be put in with a large needle,’ says Smith. ‘It's a bit painful, but it's not particularly difficult as far as minor surgery goes.'

Needless to say, DIY surgery carries with it risks and dangers. Brian McEvoy is an electonics engineer and biohacker, and like Smith belongs to a global online community called biohack.me. McEvoy, who is currently working on an implantable miniature compass, says the forum is an invaluable resource for safety information.

'I have a comically bad sense of direction, and my goal with the compass is to gain a more innate sense of direction,’ he says. ‘The way it's going to work is that when facing north and walking it will click, it will have a kind of jarring sensation, you'll take that in as another sense and make that mental map.’

There is a wearable device currently on the market called the North Paw which does a similar thing; a ring goes around the ankle and vibrates according to where north is.

McEvoy's device will go beyond wearable technology, although he hasn't yet got it to the implanting stage and is still working on the prototype. The material that he uses will be critical.

‘It's got to be made out of something that's bio-inert or bio-compatible so that my body doesn't reject it,’ he says. ‘In my left hand I have two magnets; one is coated in titanium nitride, which is bio-compatible, the other one is coated in implantable silicone; also in my left hand I have an NFC chip which can be read by my phone, and that is embedded in bio-inert glass.’

Where the compass will be implanted will depend on the final shape of the design: 'If it's shaped like a saucer or a disk, it might have to go somewhere near my shoulder. If it's shaped like a vertical tube, it can go somewhere like my leg.'

Wonders, freaks and bio-hackers Sunday 8 March 2015 Listen to the full episode of The Body Sphere to find out more about extreme body modification. More This [series episode segment] has image, and transcript

Erik Sprague is interested in pushing further into the technological future with additional modifications to his body as well.

'I've spoken with different labs about things like green luminescent proteins which are currently used in some procedures to mark cancer cells, and have famously been used for the glowing mice in laboratories,’ he says. ‘I would love to have a nice natural green glow like a jellyfish or algae. That is theoretically possible and within current technological bounds, but there are a lot of ethical questions and a lot of legal questions around actually doing it with a human being.'

For practical, if not aesthetic purposes, are we likely to see a time where the sorts of implanted devices that biohackers installed in themselves will become standard?

With fingers implanted with magnets and microchips, you could operate a computer, open your front door, play your music or scan yourself for medical conditions. McEvoy believes that this will become the norm, but it will take time for the wider public to accept the idea.

'People are getting on board with wearables now, and eventually implantables are going to become much more popular.’

Focusing on the physical, The Body Sphere is about the ways we use our bodies to create and compete, nurture and abuse, display and conceal.

