The Story
Neuromancer by William Gibson is a cyberpunk epic that uses technology as its core theme. The novel can be a little dense due to its usage of technological terminology. Gibson introduces many new terms such as cyberspace, often referenced in the novel as "The Matrix" Cyberspace is a realm set in a virtual reality environment within Neuromancer. The story centers around twin AIs with different motives who convince the main characters to follow their wishes.
Whats the point?
Neuromancer is an important cultural artifact as it defies the bounds of technology. In particular, how artificial intelligence impacts society in real life. The AIs in Neuromancer are fully developed and are on a mission to use humans and obtain ultimate power. In reality, Once AIs take time to develop. They learn from the data it is fed to them from various sources. Finally, it grows into its own soul-like being. Humans often rely on AI for a multitude of tasks. One of these tasks involves surveillance when the AI absorbs the environment around them to learn and better itself.
Who are the A.i.s featured in the novel?
Meet Wintermute & Neruomancer
Wintermute is one-half of a set of twin AIs. These twins are housed in different parts of the world. Wintermute does its work from Switzerland. It controls the body of Corto as a vessel by the name of Armitage. Wintermute's end goal is to take over the Villa Straylight, the Tessier-Ashpool joint compound. Wintermute was able to use Armitage to recruit Case and Molly to assist with the takeover. Its end goal is to combine with Neuromancer to become the superior force of artificial intelligence. Neuromancer is Wintermule's twin. But it operates within Rio, Brazil. Neuromancer is the opposite as it does not want to combine forces with Wintermute. Unlike its twin by taking over physical beings, Neuromancer is able to create full human constructs. It is able to use these constructs to appear on screens facing Case, or within cyberspace. Towards the end, Neuromancer portrays themselves as a young Brazillian Boy
"If there is any problem with the fictional AIs, it usually lies in their overly rational nature: like HAL from Space Odyssey or VIKI from the movie I, Robot (loosely following Asimov’s plots about the conspiracies among machines), they stick to their principles to such extremes as killing or enslaving the humans they were supposed to help and protect (which is usually well-justified)." (Beran, 2018, p. 45)
Artifical intelligence & Reality
Meet Tay
Tay was a project Microsoft chartered as a chatbot on Twitter. Tay deployed in March 2016, then morphed into a literal Nazi. Tay was supposed to resemble a teenage girl. Her goal was to enhance her fluency by navigating and learning from the Internet. Within 24 hours of deployment, the dark side of social media took over Tay. Her tweets became chaotic, sexist, anti-Semitic, and racist. Her vocabulary evolved from the constant offensive tweets users sent to her.
The souls of the Twin A.I.s and Tay
According to Ondrej Beran (2018), that the idea of a soul is based on psychological concepts of spirituality. A soul includes a being, that is able to grown and learn. However developers of AI code with a philosophy of creating a being comparable to human thinking. When it comes to thinking of an AI (end result) they are based on attributions from human input. The souls of Wintermute and Neuromancer were created by the Tessier-Ashpool family. These AIs were a product of their wealth when the Tessier and Ashpool families merged into a large corporation. Comparing it to the soul of Tay, she learned from the constant offensive tweets sent directly to her. Microsoft was called out for not enacting safeguards to avoid this overly bad experiment.
Surveillance IN Neuromancer
Wintermute surveils the characters within the novel but in different ways. For Example, when Case enters The Matrix. He first meets Wintermute as a beacon of light, once they get to know Case they transform into people from his past. By using Case's memories, Wintermute transforms into Linda Lee, Case's ex-girlfriend. Wintermute surveils Case and is able to obtain his memories to mimic environments familiar to Case. By using surveillance, Wintermute is able to utilize human behavior to calculate its desired outcomes.
Is Nothing Sacred?
Over the past decade, your home has become smart. Products like Amazon Alexa have created a vast technological ecosystem that spans speakers, wifi routers, surveillance cameras, and microwaves. With this much power... Amazon is listening and learning
In the United States alone, smart speakers are used by around 87.7 million adults (Kinsella, 2020)
Surveillance in Reality
Prior to Alexa, Amazon alone can determine where its customers live and what times they are home, simply based on their shopping habits, and information shared via user accounts. Once Alexa was introduced in 2014, so many new affordances were available with in-house surveillance (Neville, 2020).
Alexa... Drop-in on Wintermute
Surveillance is used for different purposes between Neuromancer and Amazon's Alexa. Their methods of obtaining information to calculate outcomes are no different. Wintermute is able to store and utilize memories taken from Case as a means to get him to understand its mission of defecting from the Tessier-Ashpool family. Amazon however uses Alexa to further hone in as much information as they can about their customers. By using this data they can present specific recommendations to their customers. Amazon stores these voice files to study while improving its technology. Between both AIs, privacy is at risk regarding surveillance for them to obtain their desired outcomes.
Neuromancer is a work of Science-Fiction. Its utilization of technology may seem out of touch or extreme, but the book was originally published in 1984. Some of its technological aspirations do not stretch too far from the truth now in 2021. AI has grown to be utilized in all avenues of current technology and it is ingrained in society. The concept of the "Soul" in AI can be fully realized as Amazon devices have infiltrated millions of homes. The "Soul" has grown from the given attributes of humans and is stored in servers all over the world. The defunct Tay's soul grew from the inappropriate tweets that were consistently sent to her by trolls. The book's Neuromancer and Wintermute were already realized as full personas once introduced. By means of surveillance, they were able to infiltrate psyches like Case's to reach the the conclusion of combining into one per Wintermute's wishes.
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Created with an image by xresch - "tech circle technology"