Science Fiction Novel the Neuromancer by William Gibson Essay

Science Fiction Novel: The Neuromancer, By William Gibson

William Gibson's The Neuromancer is particularly important for the relationship it depicts between science and society. The novel, published in 1984, is prescient in the fact that it portrays a world in which the most powerful proponents of technology are not the governments, but rather corporate entities driven by conventional notions of greed and self-serving hegemony (which are the same impetuses for most governments, interestingly enough). Yet there is a degree of relevance in this aspect of the novel that reverberates in contemporary society, particularly in light of today's economic crisis and illustrations of socio-economic abuse by corporations such as Enron. Quite simply, the degree of autonomy and influence that corporations are able to exact today are not possible without government intervention and aid. In Gibson's novel this process is alluded to the point of extremity, with corporations directly in control of the technology to most powerfully influence the world.

An excellent example of this fact lies in the author's characterization of Armitage, who was a previous military employee as Colonel Willis Corto. The effectiveness of the military (which represents the government due to the fact that it is its belligerent arm) is contrasted with that of corporate power by the fact that in the service of the military, Corto was significantly less potent than he is in the service of corporations -- specifically the Tessier-Ashpool SA, which has created two of the most dominant artificial intelligences in the novel. As a military employee, Corto is severely injured and witnesses the death of his entire cadre. In the employment of Wintermute, however, Armitage is able to operate above the auspices of the government and access resources and technology to cure men of diseases (such as that which plagues Henry Case) and to pull off sophisticated technological espionage that…