Reading Cyberpunk in the Age of AI

Society, Richard K Morgan once observed, always has been and always will be a structure for the exploitation and oppression of the majority through systems of political force dictated by an élite, enforced by thugs, uniformed or not, and upheld by willful ignorance and stupidity on the part of the majority whom the system oppresses. In Altered Carbon (2002), that observation becomes existential. Consciousness turns into software, bodies into disposable hardware, and artificial intelligence is no longer an external threat but an internal condition.