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NCT Online Science Fiction Essay

Peter Chipperfield

S2843606

New Communications Technology

Online Essay

Thursday 12-2pm

N06 0.19/0.24

Ben Ebelebe

Choose a cyberpunk story or movie. Compare the economic and social world it conjures with the real world today. How close is this imagined world to our world and: Are we moving towards the imagined world or away from it?

Whether accurate of not, the basis for the - real or imagined - future is change. The elemental factor of the past present and future is that change has occurred. Therefore the accuracy of the predictions of the future is not so relevant as the fact that change has or is going to occur. The themes of cyberpunk, science fiction, and the film Blade Runner are explained to provide detail on the subject. The film Blade Runner (1982) that was directed by Ridley Scott, and adapted from science fiction writer Phillip K Dick’s novel, Do Androids dream of electric sheep? Telling a pessimistic and seemingly unhopeful world in which humanity is less about emotion, and the phrase by Rene Descartes, “I think, therefore I am” and more about the genetic makeup of human beings. This film is both successful and unsuccessful in predicting the future of the real world’s socio-economic world.

Cyberpunk is a category that denotes a genre of science fiction (SF) set in a lawless subculture of an oppressive society dominated by computer technology. Oppressive societies in any future, real or imagined are most universally known as dystopias. Dystopias are futures where every aspect of life is altered or radically different in a degraded, totalitarian, or culturally significant manner. The society painted in dystopian novels and films are grim and pessimistic and are without much hope and highlight the negative features of government, culture, religion, and lives of the individual. Contrasting with dystopias, is the utopia, a society that functions in a manner aligned with ‘perfection’. The science fiction world that Ridley Scott creates in Blade Runner highlights the urbanised, de-humanised, chaotic, low socio-economic society where the divide between rich and poor is wide and heavily embedded in the culture. Where the richest and most powerful corporation employs a leading genetic engineer who squats in an abandoned building. To compare unhopeful imagery of the film with the society of today in the real world, it can be argued that the – dehumanising effect of the internet, the constant attention to televisions in lieu of physical social interaction, the ever widening gap between the lower socio-economic and the “one presenters” wealthy upper class elites and the war torn world in which we live is a dystopia with little hope. Genetic research has advanced scientific knowledge of the genome, chromosomes and the function and structure of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), predictions that foresaw biology not yet fully understood. Science fiction is a genre that attempts to explore the world of the future and the effect that new technologies might have on a possible world.

Science fiction is the work of an author’s imagination, and attempts to grasp a future that does not exist yet. Sometimes, the authors and filmmakers open readers and audiences to entirely new worlds and societies, making statements about future humanity. The future is dynamic and highly unpredictable, of the many different accounts by authors and filmmakers, they are likely to produce misguided conjecture that fails to become true when the future becomes the present. Some science fiction works have mused at flying cars, the implanting of internal technology, interstellar or intergalactic space travel, the consumption of food in pill form, time travel, and gene manipulation for eugenic purposes. The discovery of alien or Martian species, the transition from fossil fuels to atomic or nuclear energy, human cloning as well as the attainment of a utopia, often said highly improbable to create and the subject of much philosophical debate. With regards to the film Blade Runner, the prediction that future societies would use clones for labour purposes failed to come true. Religious and moral outrage has prevented humans from being cloned or synthetic humans from being engineered. The socio-economic world of the future is no where near and does not seem likely to transition in the direction as portrayed in Ridley Scott’s film. The expense of creating synthetic life would be costly in terms of research and manufacture, when it is cheaper to use any of the seven billion people - and rising - in the world to toil, and fight the wars of the powerful. The commonality of cloning, synthetic, and genetically modified sentient beings is prediction of the future that is a separation from the real world, the cost would just be too high and therefore the clones would be highly valuable the corporations due to the investment required to produce them. Although science fiction is not accurate in predicting the future as imagined by the creators of them, does not mean that science fiction is without merit and value, the expression of new ideas and statements made about society and humanity despite changing circumstances is useful in highlighting aspects of society that are both virtuous, desirable and deleterious and unappealing.

The basis for apt predictions of science fiction futures is an insightful author who genuinely embeds themselves into the complexities of a chaotic new world. Detaching themselves from the established lifestyle, social norms, and even transforming the present day reality. In the case of the film, Blade Runner (1982) by director Ridley Scott, adapting Phillip K Dick’s novel, Do Androids dream of electric sheep? Sees a world where cloning and genetic engineering are not only possible but fully utilised practice of the futuristic society painted in these two fictions. Ridley Scott successfully creates a world in Blade Runner that shows the audience scenes of grim, over-crowded, and bustling multi-cultural cityscapes. Constant rain and bad weather indicate climate change, which were just being noticed in the mid-seventies, the use of this relatively unknown concept and the expansion of it into the film’s modern society demonstrates that science fiction filmmakers saw the potential impacts. Detective Deckard (Harrison Ford) plays the main protagonist in Blade Runner who hunts and executes clones otherwise known as ‘replicants’ on earth. The creation of replicants for space exploration, labour and war uses unpaid work that enhances the society’s profit/production by these non-citizens. Being of superior design, a short lifespan and a total ban of any clone from earth act as controlling factors for these ‘super humans.’ The CEO of the genetic engineering corporation, Dr Eldon Tyrell is the creator of the replicants and in the film tells of the Tyrell Corporation motto, “More human than human.” The socio-economic state of earth, in particular the metropolis that Detective Deckard lives in is dark, wet, brooding, filled with poor and homeless peoples, rubbish in the street, massive skyscrapers, alleys all made of or surrounded by concrete. The discovery of genes and chromosomes were just beginning when Phillip K Dick learnt and wrote about such concepts in his science fiction works, by 1982 Ridley Scott was creating the physical world filled with the people of the future – real or cloned – that widely accepted and utilised cloning technology. Not only did this future society prefect cloning, something not done until the latter part of the 20^th century, but also the society’s spread of the applications of cloning to every sector of life and the basing of their financial structure on the use of these clones for work and expendable super human operations across the galaxy. This quantum leap from the inception of an idea to the full effects of the discovery on the futuristic society demonstrates a clear attempt at highlighting potential futures, which could exist. If the cloning aspect of Blade Runner is contrasted with computer technology, it is clear to see that a complex calculation machine transformed this real world to the industrialised and technological dependant global world of today.

The future is hard to predict and has the potential to go in many directions and change radically from what it was in the past. Science fiction writers and filmmakers endeavour to envisage a world that follows the progression of technology and anticipates how that invention would transform the world of today into a world of the imagined future. Some works of science fiction are very apt and seem to have predicted the future with accurate clarity. Novels by Phillip K Dick, Do Androids dream of electric sheep?, The Man in the High castle, A scanner darkly, and Minority Report. Ridley Scott’s film, Blade Runner made in 1982, imagined a visually stunning world that made statements about humanity and life of the future. Some aspects regarding socio-economic poverty and inhumanity can be argued as being correct predictions of a future world, but other aspects, such as a future society that allows and manufacture clones to exist and work on an industrial scale on other planets was a literal interpretation that fails to be accurate in the real world, now and in the foreseeable future.

Bibliography:

Briggs, R. 2013, "The future of prediction: speculating on William Gibson's meta-science-fiction", TEXTUAL PRACTICE, vol. 27, no. 4, pp. 671-693.

When science fiction become science fact, video, It’s okay to be smart, 19 February, viewed 19 September 2014, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ear4Prg9G8w>.

Hardesty, W.H. 1987, "Mapping the Future: Extrapolation in Utopian/Dystopian and Science Fiction", Utopian Studies, , no. 1, pp. 160-172.

With another bleakly anticipatory view of a dystopian future, The Legacy 2012, The School Library Association.

Gruenwald, O. 2013, "The dystopian imagination: the challenge of techno--utopia", Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, vol. 25, no. 1-2, pp. 1.

Malewitz, R. 2011, "William Gibson's Paternity Test", Configurations, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 25-48.

Vos Post, J. & Kroeker, K.L. 2000, "Writing the future: computers in science fiction", Computer, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 29-37.

Squire, C. 1991, "Science Fictions", Feminism & Psychology, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 181-199.

Kreuiter, A. 2009, The science of science fiction [Technological breakthroughs predicted in science fiction.], Control Publications Pty Ltd, Hawksburn.

Ghiglione, L. 2010, "Does science fiction-yes, science fiction-suggest futures for news?", Daedalus, vol. 139, no. 2, pp. 138-150.

Bell, F., Fletcher, G., Greenhill, A., Griffiths, M. & McLean, R. 2013, "Science fiction prototypes: Visionary technology narratives between futures", Futures, vol. 50, pp. 15-24.

Essay topic

I have decided to do the essay topic relating to the future predictions in cyberpunk films/novels and the socio-economic forecasts of science fiction writers.

Internet Censorship

I am strongly opposed to Internet Censorship and the previous government's policy of "clean feed" 
as is the EFA. The Labor government had Stephen Conroy the communicaitons minister introduce a policy called “clean feed” whereby adults would be subject to mandatory filters on the internet ‘for the sake of the children’. It faced extreme technical issues and vast unpopularity and subsequently died in 2012. If the Internet is censored then with it goes free speech and appropriate representation, nothing positive can come out of  a clean feed style policy.

Also, the Liberal government has also highlighted some Internet cencorship and data-mining policies recently, and Attorney-General George Brandis doesn't even have a computer at his desk! 

Oh Brave new world that hath such people in it.

Electronic Frontiers Australia Inc.. 2012. EFA welcomes the government's back down on mandatory internet . [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.efa.org.au/2012/11/09/internet-filtering-backdown/. [Accessed 04 September 14].

The relationship between Censorship and Democracy is that they are often conflicting ideals. One side allows the concealment or distortion of information that the democratic citizen attains. Whilst, the other is the participation of the citizen in the state affairs of the nation and crucial issues at the time. No nation should employ censorship, for it creates a misinformed society that will likely make worse decisions than if it were fully informed. Government, corporations and organisations censor information because they have interests that are opposed to the those of the citizens. As highlighted by Phillips and Harslof,  corporate interests and government unpopularity contribute to societies - even democratic ones - censoring information.

Peter Phillips, Ivan Harslof . 2014. Censorship Within Democratic Societies. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/CensorinDemoSoc.html%20 [Accessed 04 September 14].

What are the benefits of the NBN? What potential form(s) will the NBN take when it is finally rolled out?

The NBN is the National Broadband Network and is a national project to upgrade the old fixed line phone and Internet network to fibre optic cables. The NBN represents modern internet with faster speeds and a larger capacity for users, this will enhance communication, connectivity, internet related activities, such as live-streaming, watching videos at worldwide download speeds (no more Youtube buffering) and the ability of multiple users to access the internet at once. The NBN is to be rolled out in a number of forms, such as the fibre to the premises, fixed wireless or satellite services. It has also been introduced that a 'direct to home' model and a 'to the node' model of optic fibre might be used.

Australian politics

The Federal representative for my electorate is Ms Terri Butler MP whilst the other person of that electorate is Mr Ross Vasta MP.

Ian Walker LNP is the state member for my electorate. I sent him a message about rural children and the social services pronounced to assist them. I told him that rural children needed support networks in the countryside very much.

Posting to POTUS

I contacted US President Barak Obama about Internet freedom. I expect he will formulate an international policy quoting me at the UN.

Responding to the news

Here I responded to a major news site: ABC News 24 and their story on Asylum Seeker treatment.