Just sharing for interest and conversation. This is a pretty short article and includes just quick mentions of the genre's canon works, with a couple paragraphs about Neuromancer — arguing overall that people should worry less about the robot than the meat controlling it. This resonates with me as I feel that idea was always the real center of cyberpunk rather than the futurism fetish that sits on the surface.
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Good read and resonates with me as well.
It’s sexy and alluring to have nasty machines trying to save humanity from itself or use us as batteries because that tickles the anti-oppression itch all humans possess. But really we are and always will be our own worst enemies, capable of doing far more than any AI might come up with.
Edit typo
> arguing overall that people should worry less about the robot than the meat controlling it.
except in our time, its not contrlled by meat, but by the faceless abstractions that are corporations. I wouldnt stop worrying just yet if I were you…
AI has been around for decades it’s just hurting the artists now, but ask any Glaswegian “Shipwright by trade” from 50 years ago and they’ll tell you the same thing… “If you want to build ships, you better be the best at it with your hands, cuz the machines have taken over all of the rest, son!”
I have a problem with the author brushing aside *Bladerunner* as just man vs machines, for all his deep dive into *Neuromancer* he misses the plot entirely as it’s exactly the struggle the replicants have against their human oppressors, their end goal is just to have the right to live and die how they choose.