Cyberpunk: Of Soothsayers and Fortune Tellers.
I'm fascinated by and love the cyberpunk sub-genre of science fiction, especially its uncanny knack for predicting the future. So I want to look at the roots of what Cyberpunk is and its nature...
Billy Joe Armstrong was once asked “What’s punk?” And in reply he went to a nearby bin, kicked it over and said “That’s punk.” So, the guy who asked him the question went to a nearby bin, kicked it over and asked “Ok, so that’s punk?” And Billy Joe replied “No, that’s trendy.”
So, what is cyberpunk?
Cyberpunk started in the early 80’s. The name itself was created by Bruce Bethke in his aptly titled short story Cyberpunk released in 1983. The story follows a group of child hackers who live in a highly technological world as troublemakers.
In creating the word, Bethke said:
“How did I actually create the word? The way any new word comes into being, I guess: through synthesis. I took a handful of roots—cyber, techno, et al—mixed them up with a bunch of terms for socially misdirected youth, and tried out the various combinations until one just plain sounded right.”
Now that also sounds like cyberpunk, what with hackers causing mischief and the story itself might be a lot like it, but Bethke argues he didn’t create the cyberpunk sub-genre and that solely lies with William Gibson’s Neuromancer.
Which…!
There was a troupe of writers who took the science fiction genre and brought it to a more grounded reality. Philip K Dick had done other grounded science fiction stories, such as “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” which served as possibly the first cyberpunk story. I mean, its film adaptation of Blade Runner solidified visually what cyberpunk is. But these writers led by Bruce Sterling created this counterculture movement that would shape the 80’s, predict the 90’s, and continue to be reflective and influential on our modern world, on society as it is today.
These writers were Bruce Sterling, Tom Maddox, Pat Cadigan, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley, Greg Bear, Marc Laidlaw, James Patrick Kelly, Lewis Shiner, Paul Di Filippo, and William Gibson. Bruce Sterling compiled short stories from these writers and edited together an anthology of what he believed to be cyberpunk. The collections were released in a book called Mirrorshades: A Cyberpunk Anthology. This collection of short stories established what cyberpunk is… Well, sort of. This collection of short stories didn’t come out until 1986. We need to go back a couple of years.
To 1984! No, not Orwell’s 1984, although that itself is highly relative as well and serves as an early progenitor to cyberpunk too.
But to the year Neuromancer was released!
“The sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel.” The opening line of William Gibson’s debut novel. Immediately that sets the tone, the mood, the setting, and the story’s use of technology. Already you’re imagining a cloudy, grey, dead sky that may as well be filled with TV static. This was the line that kicked off cyberpunk totally.
Gibson had already written other science fiction short stories which were later collected in another anthology book by himself called Burning Chrome, self-titled after a short story of his of the same name. The collection also collected stories such as The Gernsback Continuum, Johnny Mnemonic, Dogfight, Hinterlands, and Red Star, Winter Orbit.
But Neuromancer really set the stage for what cyberpunk is. Neuromancer follows a hacker, a console cowboy, called Case who is hired to hack into an A.I. so that it may merge with the eponymous Neuromancer.
Neuromancer is not quite like other typical science fiction stories. It is a grounded story not set in the stars but one of a dystopian, gritty, near future world. High tech, low life; that is what cyberpunk is at its core.
Visually, cyberpunk is a sprawling cluster of crystal skyscrapers and corrugated slums, decorated with neon lights and holograms, advertisements and grime. Its run down and well-worn, well used streets littered with people decked out in futuristic fashion and fashionable body prosthetics, hovercars streaming overhead and law enforcement patrolling throughout like an anti-virus abating and oppressing a disenfranchised and viral people.
Instead of following typical science fiction tropes, it takes some influences from detective noir stories. Case is an anti-hero. He is not selfless, he is selfish. His motivations throughout the story are led through self-interest, not for the interest of others.
At the start of the story, Case’s nervous system is damaged by a mycotoxin, thereby making him incapable of entering the matrix; cyberspace. Kind of an important thing when you’re a console cowboy. But then comes Armitage, the man who wants to hire him for his hacking skills. As an incentive he repairs his broken nervous system, fixes his liver and replaces his pancreas so he can no longer get doped up. He’s cured his drug addiction and fixed his damaged nervous system. HOWEVER! Not without any kind of stipulations. Along with his new body, he also has these sacs implanted within his blood cells that will release the same mycotoxin that paralysed him in the first place if he doesn’t finish his job in time. If he does, they will be removed.
So, his motivations are solely for himself. He doesn’t much care for the good of mankind or humanity or the sake of others. He’s just using his skills that are bought so he can get these sacs out and stay in cyberspace, a place he is almost addicted to and has missed sorely.
And therein lies what is cyberpunk. A lead with almost selfish motivations just doing their job. And the lead is usually a grizzled detective type reminiscent of its inspired detective noir tales; Rick Deckard, JC Denton, Adam Jensen, Case, Takeshi Kovacs, V, to name a few.
But they do tend to wind out the other way by the end. Their intentions change from something selfish to almost selfless. Deckard goes to saving Rachel and running away with her. Denton goes from carrying out a simple anti-terrorism agency job until he winds up having the choice to change the world and gain control of it via the illuminati or let things be and let people choose their own fate, as does Adam Jensen. Case changes his views after realising the extent of the A.I.’s Neuromancer and Wintermute. Takeshi Kovacs becomes invested in the case he was hired for to selflessly help others. V is more concerned about getting a parasitic ghost of a terrorist out of his brain but along the way has a choice to help others or use them for his own selfish ways, but if you’re more emp
That is generally how its main characters go, often supported by a femme fatale and its antagonists’ governments and corporations.
Case is supported by the mirror-eyed razor-fingertipped Molly Millions on his job. Deckard has Rachel and goes against the Tyrell Corporation and Roy Batty. Denton has Anna Navarre and battles against Majestic 12 and the Illuminati and corporations that withhold the cure to the Gray Death. Jensen with Eliza Cassan against the media, Illuminati and medical corporations.
Although, they don’t always go against governments and corporations. Sometimes rogue A.I.s play a highly pivotal part as an antagonist in a cyberpunk story. For example, Neo goes against the Matrix, and there is HAL of 2001, AM of Harlan Ellison’s I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, 1984’s Big Brother, and the mother of all psychopathic A.I.’s, Shodan of the System Shock series.
And there too are their antagonists! The protagonist often winding up in the wrong place at the wrong time, uncovering a conspiracy, and chased and opposed by governments and corporations.
Which, I believe, is what leads into its punk-ish nature.
These stories have dystopian worlds controlled by corporations, corrupt governments and money and technology. And these small groups of individuals use their rebellious talents and skills to revolt against them, to counter against their imposed culture. A counterculture. And who couldn’t relate to that today in our modern world?
That’s what makes these stories and this subgenre so reflective and so relatable to today’s modern world. These stories show back at us the truth of how the world is and can be and what would rise up against it. Rebellion and revolution. Power to the people. Power corrupts absolute and governments and corporations ruling unchecked. All that wonderful stuff. And you see that whenever we look at anything on social media or TV today. Governments and politicians leading with corruption and ignorance, inciting hatred and bigotry. Corporations operating unchecked and unruly, disobeying laws and avoiding taxes and mistreating its employees. And its people revolting against them. Protesting and rebelling for order. For control over our landscape, over our climate, our countries, and our rights.
We live in a cyberpunk world. And it was predicted way back in 1984…
How? Well, here’s how. Let’s pedal back a little. I’m getting a little ahead of myself.
What is cyberspace? Gibson always envisioned cyberspace as a separate location differentiating from here in the real world to over there somewhere.
Cyberspace is the matrix, a vast network of information and otherworldly place that is different from here to there from our physical world to a digital world of data and ones and zeroes.
It is the internet.
The internet didn’t come about fully until the mid 90’s. 6 plus years after Neuromancer was first published. But also, a further 8 plus years since Gibson’s short story Burning Chrome. Because the term and concept of cyberspace was first coined in that short story published in 1982.
Now, quickly, Burning Chrome follows the story of two hackers who hack into a criminal’s bank account and rob him dry. But it was in this story that the term cyberspace was first used. Neuromancer only elaborated on further on what cyberspace is; a digital platform that served predictively to what will eventually become the internet.
An 80’s science fiction story predicted the internet that would come 10 years later.
In pouring over these cyberpunk literatures and films and games and tv shows there is one thing that becomes apparent if you look at things a little closely. Not only do they share the same visual flares, the same literary tropes and themes and tones, and not only are they highly reflective on our modern world but they are also scarily predictive of the future, which in part is why they’re so reflective of today’s world.
These books and films were published and released in the 80’s and 90’s. Deus Ex and the Matrix were released in the turn of the century and they too predicted the future. No matter which decade or century the works are released, the works of cyberpunk have the uncanny ability to predict the future. Our current world. But how?
Neuromancer predicted the internet, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and in other works of Gibson he has predicted things like reality TV and as a whole predicted a whole culture. Gibson’s Idoru also predicted holographic idols ala Hatsune Miku and to an extent VTubers. He has also predicted internet culture, celebrity status and web design especially its differences between coporate designed and independently designed.
Blade Runner (or much rather Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?) also predicted much of a societal collapse and the way media operates with 24 hour television. It also predicted video calls that is a commonplace today from Skype to Zoom calls, though Star Trek did predict something like this as well in the 60’s, especially with flip phones. Futurist and concept artist for Blade Runner, Syd Mead, once said “Science fiction is the real world ahead of schedule.” As a futurist it was his job to realise these futuristic ideas into the real world and a lot of other concept designs of his implemented into Blade Runner would later predict and influence what we see in the real world today, particularly how our homes are laid out.
Akira predicted the 2020 Olympics set in Tokyo, albeit in reality it’s the 32nd while the anime predicted it to be the 30th.
Even scarily, Deus Ex predicted the fall of the twin towers. Deus Ex was released in July 2000. Its opening level is set on Liberty Island. From it, the player can look out to the New York skyline, but curiously the twin towers are missing. Factually, they were absent because of technical and memory limitations and so they were cut out and story-wise it was told they were destroyed in a terrorist attack early on in the game’s world. Cut to a year later in September 2001…
Deus Ex was also very good at predicting a modern day pandemic, conspiracies surrounding it, the public’s behaviour towards it and developments for a cure. The Gray Death is a manmade nano-virus in the game afflicting those with nanoaugmentation. The cure for the virus is a vaccine called Ambrosia and both were created by the game’s antagonist Bob Page as a way to cull the population and gain control over the world through Majestic 12. This secret organisation is the only one who can produce the vaccine and decide how much is made thereby causing strife through manipulation and restrictions. Arguments can be made for it predicting the Coronavirus pandemic, its origins and conspiracy theories surrounding it and access for vaccines. But certainly this plot point does hit close to home in how the world is currently.
Matt Frewer’s A.I TV host Max Headroom also predicted streamers and VTubers and streamers almost obsessive observations on viewer statistics and behaviour over the matter.
Cyberpunk has proven time and time again to have an uncanny talent for predicting the future. I shan’t be listing off every single prediction the cyberpunk sub genre has ever made or else this will go on longer than it needs to. But if you’re curious enough there’s dozens of sources to look into to find out more predictions. As a starting point, Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash and its mention of the metaverse, which, while the concept has been getting more recognition as of late with connections to NFT’s it is not a new concept at all. Second Life? Habbo Hotel?
One last example, the 1988 roleplaying game Cyberpunk 2020 (curiously the year Cyberpunk 2077 came out. Coincidences, coincidences…) the setting of that world is shockingly prescient and reflective on our modern world as well. In short, America had a societal collapse due to racism, cultural identity and diversity. In a country where everyone is special and unique, everyone vied for recognition and developed a “me first” attitude. In the end this collapse of diversity bore anarchy.
This, unfortunately, is very true to today. A simple google search on reactions to the Cyberpunk 2077 game will proclaim enough its reflective attitudes from a roleplaying rulebook released 34 years ago. But look elsewhere in the world or on the internet and you can see this.
George Orwell’s 1984 could arguably be considered cyberpunk. It is dystopic and though not as high tech as the worlds of Cyberpunk and Gibson’s Sprawl, it has a technology of its own and follows the same tropes as cyberpunk. More obviously, a dictative and controlling government that controls what you think and feel, and rebellion and free thinking means death or “readjustment”.
With 1984’s Big Brother, it predicted an ever present surveillance system that watches and records our every move, records our data and information and sells it off. And scarily, that is true in the case of Google and Facebook. And not just there but YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, Tumblr, all social media as a whole! The scariest thing about this, however, isn’t that Orwell predicted it and it came true, but that we welcomed it with open arms and continue to invite it and allow it to watch and observe us. As much as we claim to be against it or try to cut social media out from our lives, and we don’t care… as long as it feeds our ego and gives us a few short minutes of recognition, satisfaction and validity.
Cyberpunk is scarily reflective on our modern world. It’s accurate in its reflections because its predictions were made at a time that had civil and societal unrest and with it being set in our time, a near future. Blade Runner is set in 2019 as was Akira. Matrix was set in a parallel 1999. Deus Ex is set in 2052 with Human Revolution 2027! Who knows how much our world might change to look more like Human Revolution’s dystopia and how accurate would that game become? Well, give it 5 years…
But these predictions of a future that we somehow fell into, were they deliberate? Is William Gibson a prophet? Is Warren Spector some kind of soothsayer? Are these writers of cyberpunk media prescient?
Well, no. Or are they?
Let’s look at it pragmatically.
The truth behind Deus Ex’s spooky predictions of the twin towers happened by pure accident. It wasn’t intended, it wasn’t deliberate, and the writers didn’t look into a crystal ball to foresee what could be. They simply logically thought about current events, looked at history (as history often helps foretell the future sometimes) and figured out and questioned what could logically make the most sense for the absence of such an important pair of buildings? What is the nature of this world they were telling? What is the history of their current world that would help inform their world’s future? The answer was terrorism.
The twin towers were always threatened and made a target for a terrorist attack dating as far back as the 90’s with a failed bombing attempt in a van in the parking area basement. The world of Deus Ex is a world plagued with conspiracy theories that are all true and a world rife with terrorist attacks. I mean, Lady Liberty is missing her head for god’s sake. It’s one of the first things you see. So, logically they made the choice that the most rational reason why there would be no towers would be a terrorist attack. And, unfortunately, in the real world that came to be true.
That is how that prediction panned out. A complete accident.
But how about Gibson’s predictions?
Well, let’s look at him as a person. His knowledge and experiences. For starters, he is computer illiterate. He is not a ludite but the absolute irony that the man who created the bible for our technological world and realms of the internet, virtual reality and our cyberspace doesn’t know a thing about computers. Gibson was confused the first time he heard a hard disk drive whir, which also ruined his fantastical expectations on how computers worked in his mind. He is not a typist either, even more ironically as a writer who has written over 12 books, scripts and numerous short stories. He writes with index fingers, slowly, on a typewriter. Even more ironic! He wrote a digital story on something analogue.
But is he prescient? No, not at all. He has denied ever being such a thing over and over again. He is not a fortune teller and simply in his own rationale and logical thinking dictated what could be in his world in a distant future with great imagination and lack of prejudice and his work simply inspired the real world change as it caught up to his. He’s predicted and gotten a lot of things right but there are still things he got wrong. For example he didn’t predict mobile phones let alone smartphones in Neuromancer and his idea of how the internet and cyberspace works doesn’t match up to how the internet actually works now. Gibson has stated early on in his career he is much more of a surrealist of the modern world than a predictive science ficton writer, and that “science fiction writers aren't fortune tellers. Fortune tellers are fakes. Fortune tellers are either deluded or charlatans.” And that you can find science fiction writers who are deluded or who are charlatans, not both.
Therefore all of these uncanny predictions happened purely by accident based on keen observation, knowledge of history and the modern world, and a little imagination. Science fiction has always tried to foretell or create the future. but cyberpunk in its own focus on what is going on in the modern world politically and technologically and expanding on it in a fantastical way ends up hitting cyclical beats of history that tends to repeat itself. If you’re observant enough and well versed in history and can see these rhythmic and cyclical patterns, if you’re astute enough you’ll hit these same beats. Thereby creating these predictions.
One other more common example of something fictional that has predicted the future is The Simpsons. For years The Simpsons have become notorious for predicting the future from things like touch pad screens, Trump’s presidency, and 9/11 as well. However, while The Simpsons isn’t cyberpunk it is a work of satirical comedy and is itself another reflection of us and the modern world. They work in the same creative headspace as cyberpunk writers do and as such in sharply observing our world and reflecting upon it and spitballing ideas of what could happen they will wind up coming upon something that would realistically happen by complete accident. Talented writers like these tend to have such a laser focused finger on the pulse of how society and history works that they will find the right beat that leads them to fortelling the future and always it will be coincidental.
But then that begs another question, one that unfolds evermore into other realms; does our cultural output influence our society as much as our society influences our cultural output? Is it all just a microcosm of a symbiotic, recycling system of copies of copies, where history repeats itself over and over and we recreate that history and society catches up to the imaginations of another decades ago?
Simply, does life imitate art as much as art imitates life?