The Body Project: Transhumanism, Posthumanism and Modification in Twentieth Century Cyberpunk
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The Body Project: Transhumanism, Posthumanism and Modification in Twentieth Century Cyberpunk Gul Dag, BA (Hons.) (Brighton), MA (Hull) Submitted to the University of Hull in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Hull May 2020 Abstract This thesis focuses upon the social, cultural and political implications of employing radical body modification practices through an analysis of late twentieth century cyberpunk texts. Using the early works of William Gibson, Rudy Rucker and George Alec Effinger, the aim of this thesis is to demonstrate the ways in which cyberpunk writing works to critique the inherently transhumanist desire for creating technologically advanced societies in which the human race will potentially come to be replaced by a far superior race of posthumans. The thesis begins with an examination of the history of transhumanist thought, and applies the central tenets of transhumanism to the cyberpunk works of Gibson, Rucker and Effinger to illustrate the ways in which cyberpunk critiques the concept and deployment of revolutionary technologies in its analyses of near-future technologically advanced societies. The subsequent chapters of this thesis focus upon specific aspects of selected cyberpunk texts, including the commodification and fetishisation of the modified body; theologically-informed technological transcendence; the assertion of identity and sense of self in the modified subject; and the treatment of women in the race towards posthumanity. While a great deal of critical attention has been paid to the work of high profile cyberpunk writers such as Gibson, the works of other writers such as Rucker and Effinger have been comparatively ignored. The aim of this thesis is to address this imbalance, and to provide in-depth analyses of not only Gibson’s well-known Sprawl Trilogy (1984- 1988), but also of Rucker’s Ware Tetralogy (1982-2000) and Effinger’s Marîd Audran series (1986-1991). All three sets of texts challenge the reader to consider not only the personal, but also the social, cultural and geopolitical implications of both the local and global employment of radical technologies, and this thesis analyses these implications using a transhumanist framework. Acknowledgments I would like to thank my parents, Elif and Dervis Dag for their continued support throughout my studies. Thank you to my supervisor, Dr Kevin Corstorphine for his advice and support, and for enabling me to take ownership of this project, and to Professor James Connelly for his guidance. Thanks also go to Sandie Mills, Layla Hendow and Catherine Sadler for our regular thesis boot camps, and also to Dr Martin Wilcox for allowing us to use Blaydes House for these sessions. Thank you to Nadine Baptiste for the continued support and for always being there with advice and a kind word. I would also like to thank Mollie and Bella, who have both remained by my side throughout the production of this thesis. Finally, special thanks go to the Doctoral College for arranging regular thesis boot camps and writing retreats. These have been invaluable to me, and I hope that these will continue to take place for the benefit of future PhD students. Contents Introduction 1 Cyberpunk: A Brief History 1 Cyberpunk: Then and Now 10 Gibson, Rucker and Effinger 15 Transhumanism 24 Importance 26 Terms and Scope 31 Concepts and Questions 37 Findings 38 Overview of Thesis Chapters 43 Chapter One: The Transhuman Project: Creating the Posthuman 47 The History of Transhumanist Thought 48 The (Post)Human Condition 50 The Individual versus the Corporation 61 The Haves and the Have Nots 75 The Bioconservative Argument 84 A New Eugenics? 93 Conclusion 96 Chapter Two: Transcending the Meat: the Consumer, the Commodity and the Cannibal 98 Meat in the Machine 100 Flesh and Disgust 111 Gendered Flesh 126 The Commodified Self 130 Cannibal Animals 131 Conclusion 138 Chapter Three: Theology, Immortality and the Sacred Self 142 Transcendence 144 The Sacred Self 154 The Immortal Self 161 Post-Revolutionary Posthumanism 170 Conclusion 173 Chapter Four: The Reluctant Posthumans: Memory, Identity and the Perception of the Self in the Modified Subject 177 Consciousness 179 War Trauma, Disability and Mental Health 182 Constructing Armitage 188 Fractured Memories/Fractured Identities 190 The Augmented Mind 198 The “Immortal” Dr Anderson 202 Public Perception 207 Reasserting the Self 213 Conclusion 217 Chapter Five: Cyberpunk and Feminist Discourse 219 Cyberpunk versus Feminist Science Fiction 223 Molly Millions 228 Selling Sex in the Budayeen 240 Cyberpunk as Anti-Feminist? 249 The Posthuman Woman 251 Conclusion 255 Conclusion 257 Bibliography 269 Introduction ‘The body is a strange obsession in the cyberpunk universe.’1 The central aim of this thesis is to establish a direct and fundamental link between the late twentieth century works of three cyberpunk writers, namely William Gibson, Rudy Rucker and George Alec Effinger, and transhumanist thought. Using transhumanism as the main theoretical framework, this thesis applies the key tenets of transhumanism as established by both early proponents such as Julian Huxley and contemporary advocates including Nick Bostrom, Max More and FM-2030 to interrogate the ways in which Gibson, Rucker and Effinger critiqued the concept of transhumanism in their writing in a number of significant ways. Through an analysis of the myriad body modification practices that exist within these texts, this thesis focuses upon the ways in which an adherence to transhumanist ideals in the technologically advanced societies depicted in these novels will have considerable personal, social, cultural and geopolitical implications, as the overwhelming desire for a technologically driven transcendence will lead to widespread abuse, exploitation and degradation. Cyberpunk: A Brief History The term cyberpunk was originally coined by Bruce Bethke, whose short story ‘Cyberpunk’ was written in 1980 and eventually published in 1983 by Amazing Stories, and featured a group of teenage hackers who are able to access security systems and steal from a bank using fake accounts in a series of funds transfers. The term cyberpunk was then picked up and used by other writers such as Gardner Dozois, John Shirley and 1 (Dyens, 2001: 77) 1 Bruce Sterling, and began to gain traction at the various conventions and conferences that these writers were attending in the 1980s. In his foreword to the 1997 edition of Bruce Sterling’s The Artificial Kid (1980), William Gibson refers to a panel at the World Science Fiction Convention in 1981 in Denver, in which he read his short story ‘Burning Chrome’ to a small audience that included Bruce and Nancy Sterling, as being ‘the Ground Zero of Cyberpunk’ (Gibson, 1997: 3), and he goes on to discuss Dozois’ early influence upon the creation of the movement: At this same convention Gardner Dozois will chair a panel called “Beyond The Punk Nebula.” I won’t be on it, but Dozois will point me out, as I enter the hall, as one of those doing whatever it is that he seems to be arguing is happening. (Let me take this opportunity to state that I remain convinced that Garner Dozois is, in some profoundly mysterious way, personally responsible for cyberpunk. That he somehow willed it into being. He put that panel together, and argued, from no evidence whatever, that something new was afoot. And, henceforth, it was.) (Gibson, 1997: 3) Whilst Gibson credits Dozois with being responsible for cyberpunk, most writers, readers and critics of cyberpunk agree that it was Gibson’s first novel that was the ultimate catalyst that brought cyberpunk into the public sphere, allowing it to progress from being a niche science fiction subgenre into a bona fide movement that had an impact upon literature, art and culture. On his website, Bethke credits William Gibson’s ground-breaking novel Neuromancer (1984) with having ultimately defined the movement, and views his own contribution as being that of introducing a specific style of character: what I set out to do was to name a character type. And the primary definition of cyberpunk – the one that gets used in every news story about computer crime – is my definition: a young, technologically facile, ethically vacuous, computer- adept vandal or criminal. (Bethke, 2010) Bethke’s story had a profound impact on science fiction, and it ensured that Gibson’s novel, which was published the following year, was instantly recognised and categorised as cyberpunk. Cyberpunk writers were influenced by an array of genres, writers and movements; they drew inspiration from science fiction writers such as 2 Philip K. Dick, Harlan Ellison and J.G. Ballard, from the various counterculture movements of the mid-to-late twentieth century and were aesthetically influenced by punk fashion and music.2 Cyberpunk very quickly became an instantly recognisable term for fans of science fiction, and the term itself became synonymous with a very particular aesthetic and political outlook. A portmanteau of cybernetics and punk, cyberpunk took a deliberate step away from the science fiction subgenres that came before and presented readers with societies, characters and lifestyles that were decidedly different: The punk is referring to the low life, the working or lower middle-class characters, the have-nots, who populate such fiction. Rather than rocket scientists and beautiful daughters, cyberpunk features drug dealers, drug users, musicians, skateboarders as characters, as well as various hackers. (Butler, 2000: