The many delights of Cyberpunk...

This week in NCT we explored the Science Fiction that is Cyberpunk. Think Matrix. Think Star Wars. My understanding of Cyberpunk is the Mythical prediction of our technological future. The ongoing progression of Technology is often viewed to be the ongoing progression of a mythical Utopia. A Utopia where humankind will be in control of everything - even mother nature. A "perfect society" where nothing will be natural - everything will be artificial and it will be perfect because we created it for ourselves. We become the Gods of a new era. But then - things go tragically wrong - our universe is failing. Technology fails us and we now have nothing to rely on. Nature is long forgotten - there is limited food, limited water, limited oxygen. Humanity has come to realise that the perfect world they created was only concealing the hellish reality that lay beneath....Something to think about anyway.

I personally think that if there was such a thing as Utopia, we'd have passed it ages ago. Somewhere, long ago when Nature and Humans were in harmony. There was none of this pollution, no corporate logging companies. Life may have been a hell of a lot harder - but i think it would have been worth it. So i guess we're talking long, long ago - when there were only indigenous humans. But if there was this Utopia somewhere in the future that was created from technological advance; i think that it would be only a short time of bliss - and then further technological progression or lack of energy would ruin it. I guess i justify that opinion by the same notes that were posted in the lecture. The fact that every other proposed Utopia is eventually destroyed due to the attainment of knowledge - or the progression of technology. Take for example the Adam and Eve story. Adam and Eve gain knowledge by eating the fruit - but in turn they are banished from their perfect world. Or the story of Faust - the brilliant Doctor who sells his soul to the devil to gain more knowledge and power. We all know that couldn't end in happiness. So this idea of the attainment of knowledge and technological advance has been fictionally portrayed as a negative. Knowledge is not always power.

So some other things Steve talked about during the lecture were - cities as machines - The alternative myths of the way cities will be created in the future. A machine for living - whereas it creates human life just as humans create it. A natural city - created by natural beings - just as bee-hives are by bees. Or a city as a living being - a cyborg which combines human tissue with sythetic infrastructure. This among many more interesting ideas of Cyberpunk.

Next post will be my essay - until next time - i bid you adieu.