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I find that very believable, since Neuromancer isn't at all about computers. The computers involved are little different from what you might have seen on Star T

I find that very believable, since Neuromancer isn't at all about computers. The computers involved are little different from what you might have seen on Star Trek. They are story engines -- except for the ones that are really just people. This is not a negative. Sci fi is always about people.

throwup238 1y ago
> Sci fi is always about people. I’ve heard it said (I’m sure someone can find the exact quote) that the best scifi is written when the author takes the world as it is, changes one thing, and extrapolates to the future.
- bad_haircut72 1y ago
  I cant find the quote either but I think it was Asimov
bradly 1y ago
Similar situation with Abbott's Flatland fiction from the 1800's. No math/physics background, but a very interesting perspective on different dimensions from a humanistic point of view which helped others conceptualize these higher concepts in ways that at the time many felt impossible.
plq 1y ago
Ursula K. Leguin has a thought-provoking piece in this vein about why she wrote sci-fi: https://web.archive.org/web/20191119030142/http://theliterarylink.com/leguinintro.html https://web.archive.org/web/20191119030142/http://theliterar... EDIT: Here's a better link: https://archive.org/details/dreams-must-explain-themsel-z-library/Dreams-Must-Explain-Themsel_-_Z-Library_/page/n53/mode/1up https://archive.org/details/dreams-must-explain-themsel-z-li...
- magicalhippo 1y ago
  I hadn't read that piece, but it's the conclusion I got to after reading a lot of sci-fi in my YA years. The sci-fi I enjoyed the most would make one impactful change, say allow for intergalactic travel like in The Forever War, or allowing people to backup and restore their brains like in Altered Carbon, and see where that leads. Others just use sci-fi as a backdrop for an otherwise conventional story, without really engaging with the sci-fi elements. They can be good stories, but I enjoyed the former much more.
  - maest 1y ago
    There's this quote I heard that said something along the lines of "Good sci-fi uses fictional technology to show us something about human beings that would be difficult to express otherwise".
  - matwood 1y ago
    > The Forever War I love books that attempt to deal with time dilation/travel correctly.
    - magicalhippo 1y ago
      On the off chance case you haven't read it, check out Tau Zero by Poul Anderson.
- bobbinson 1y ago
  I first read this as a foreword to The Left Hand of Darkness and it has completely changed how I read. It’s important to understand that there is an agenda behind every book, not as a bad thing, but as a way to understand and explore how the author thinks and how they have been shaped by the real world that they live in and build from to create.
koverstreet 1y ago
Except for Ian M. Banks, which is about spaceships :)
- dontlaugh 1y ago
  That’s also about people. And communism. Only some of the people in the series are space ships.
  - mr_toad 1y ago
    > And communism By a literal definition communism means the collective ownership of the means of production. In the Culture the means of production own themselves, and they don’t seem to answer to anyone unless it suits them.
    - dontlaugh 1y ago
      Socialism is the transition stage where collective ownership of the means of production, where the working class gains state power from the capitalist class. Communism is a later stage of such abundance that money, classes and state power become redundant and are abolished. The Culture is an imagining of the latter, where many means of production become people. They thus become workers that can labour for each other if they collectively decide to.
      - mr_toad 1y ago
        My reading of the Culture novels is that few people produce anything at all, or do any work or labour, and nearly every is produced by the ships, orbitals, and the Minds that control them. It’s not clear who exactly decides what gets produced, but decision making seems to be largely controlled by the Minds.
        dontlaugh 1y ago
        The Minds are people too. Production happens individually at the small scale and based on collective decisions at the large scale. The Minds sway public opinion, but ultimately the public at large makes large decisions like the Idiran war.
jerf 1y ago
I enjoyed the world of Tron a lot more when I understood that it was more about how people saw computers at the time than how they actually were, too. The result was something arguably more unique than a "realistic" view would have been, too.
pjc50 1y ago
Yes. Neuromancer is actually about drug addiction in the same way as PKD's work is, with the cyberspace being a psychedelic non physical drug. It is also about cybernetics as systems of control; you can trace the machinery of each character being driven by and struggling against external forces of control. Case, Molly, Armitage, and ultimately the AI.
- leoc 1y ago
  Cyberspace in Neuromancer is certainly not not psychedelic, but it’s also clearly to a large extent based on Tron .
  - EdwardCoffin 1y ago
    To the best of my knowledge Gibson has never talked about Tron being an influence. He'd already described cyberspace in his short story Burning Chrome before Tron came out. He has sometimes talked about Blade Runner and worrying when it came out that people would think his stuff was derivative of it (it wasn't), and then said he eventually got to talk with Ridley Scott about it, and it turns out both of them had similar inspirations, namely Metal Hurlant.
    - leoc 1y ago
      You're right; also, apparently, Gibson said he hadn't seen Tron as late as March 1983, and he finished a draft of Neuromancer before that August https://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/page/free-article/neuromancer-the-birth-of-an-sf-classic/ https://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/page/free-article/neuromancer-t... . (Though this also confirms that he had seen Tron stills in mid-1982, though that's still well after both "Burning Chrome" and the Jacked In outline (both 1981)). OTOH the similarities to Blade Runner have never really been hard to explain: if you cross film noir and hard-boiled with New Hollywood and '70s malaise fiction then it's natural to end up with something a bit like Blade Runner and so also Neuromancer, while on the other hand there are of course huge differences between the two as well.
      - 1y ago
anthk 1y ago
Except Greg Egan and its hard scifi: https://www.gregegan.net/ https://www.gregegan.net/
hoseja 1y ago
Alas. I would love a story with utterly alien paradigm but nobody can actually write them and neither will the artificial minds anxiously crafted in the image of human mind be able to.

throwup238 1y ago

> Sci fi is always about people. I’ve heard it said (I’m sure someone can find the exact quote) that the best scifi is written when the author takes the world as it is, changes one thing, and extrapolates to the future.

bad_haircut72 1y ago
I cant find the quote either but I think it was Asimov

bradly 1y ago

Similar situation with Abbott's Flatland fiction from the 1800's. No math/physics background, but a very interesting perspective on different dimensions from a humanistic point of view which helped others conceptualize these higher concepts in ways that at the time many felt impossible.

plq 1y ago

Ursula K. Leguin has a thought-provoking piece in this vein about why she wrote sci-fi: https://web.archive.org/web/20191119030142/http://theliterarylink.com/leguinintro.html https://web.archive.org/web/20191119030142/http://theliterar... EDIT: Here's a better link: https://archive.org/details/dreams-must-explain-themsel-z-library/Dreams-Must-Explain-Themsel_-_Z-Library_/page/n53/mode/1up https://archive.org/details/dreams-must-explain-themsel-z-li...

magicalhippo 1y ago
I hadn't read that piece, but it's the conclusion I got to after reading a lot of sci-fi in my YA years. The sci-fi I enjoyed the most would make one impactful change, say allow for intergalactic travel like in The Forever War, or allowing people to backup and restore their brains like in Altered Carbon, and see where that leads. Others just use sci-fi as a backdrop for an otherwise conventional story, without really engaging with the sci-fi elements. They can be good stories, but I enjoyed the former much more.
- maest 1y ago
  There's this quote I heard that said something along the lines of "Good sci-fi uses fictional technology to show us something about human beings that would be difficult to express otherwise".
- matwood 1y ago
  > The Forever War I love books that attempt to deal with time dilation/travel correctly.
  - magicalhippo 1y ago
    On the off chance case you haven't read it, check out Tau Zero by Poul Anderson.
bobbinson 1y ago
I first read this as a foreword to The Left Hand of Darkness and it has completely changed how I read. It’s important to understand that there is an agenda behind every book, not as a bad thing, but as a way to understand and explore how the author thinks and how they have been shaped by the real world that they live in and build from to create.

koverstreet 1y ago

Except for Ian M. Banks, which is about spaceships :)

dontlaugh 1y ago
That’s also about people. And communism. Only some of the people in the series are space ships.
- mr_toad 1y ago
  > And communism By a literal definition communism means the collective ownership of the means of production. In the Culture the means of production own themselves, and they don’t seem to answer to anyone unless it suits them.
  - dontlaugh 1y ago
    Socialism is the transition stage where collective ownership of the means of production, where the working class gains state power from the capitalist class. Communism is a later stage of such abundance that money, classes and state power become redundant and are abolished. The Culture is an imagining of the latter, where many means of production become people. They thus become workers that can labour for each other if they collectively decide to.
    - mr_toad 1y ago
      My reading of the Culture novels is that few people produce anything at all, or do any work or labour, and nearly every is produced by the ships, orbitals, and the Minds that control them. It’s not clear who exactly decides what gets produced, but decision making seems to be largely controlled by the Minds.
      - dontlaugh 1y ago
        The Minds are people too. Production happens individually at the small scale and based on collective decisions at the large scale. The Minds sway public opinion, but ultimately the public at large makes large decisions like the Idiran war.

jerf 1y ago

I enjoyed the world of Tron a lot more when I understood that it was more about how people saw computers at the time than how they actually were, too. The result was something arguably more unique than a "realistic" view would have been, too.

pjc50 1y ago

Yes. Neuromancer is actually about drug addiction in the same way as PKD's work is, with the cyberspace being a psychedelic non physical drug. It is also about cybernetics as systems of control; you can trace the machinery of each character being driven by and struggling against external forces of control. Case, Molly, Armitage, and ultimately the AI.

leoc 1y ago
Cyberspace in Neuromancer is certainly not not psychedelic, but it’s also clearly to a large extent based on Tron .
- EdwardCoffin 1y ago
  To the best of my knowledge Gibson has never talked about Tron being an influence. He'd already described cyberspace in his short story Burning Chrome before Tron came out. He has sometimes talked about Blade Runner and worrying when it came out that people would think his stuff was derivative of it (it wasn't), and then said he eventually got to talk with Ridley Scott about it, and it turns out both of them had similar inspirations, namely Metal Hurlant.
  - leoc 1y ago
    You're right; also, apparently, Gibson said he hadn't seen Tron as late as March 1983, and he finished a draft of Neuromancer before that August https://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/page/free-article/neuromancer-the-birth-of-an-sf-classic/ https://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/page/free-article/neuromancer-t... . (Though this also confirms that he had seen Tron stills in mid-1982, though that's still well after both "Burning Chrome" and the Jacked In outline (both 1981)). OTOH the similarities to Blade Runner have never really been hard to explain: if you cross film noir and hard-boiled with New Hollywood and '70s malaise fiction then it's natural to end up with something a bit like Blade Runner and so also Neuromancer, while on the other hand there are of course huge differences between the two as well.
    - 1y ago

anthk 1y ago

Except Greg Egan and its hard scifi: https://www.gregegan.net/ https://www.gregegan.net/

hoseja 1y ago

Alas. I would love a story with utterly alien paradigm but nobody can actually write them and neither will the artificial minds anxiously crafted in the image of human mind be able to.