According to the lore of Shadowrun, the demise of the world into a cyberpunk dystopia occurs when

megacorporations become the ruling elite through taking advantage of four key things - a pandemic
plague, a series of world wars, the emergence of magic and a virus that crashes the internet. These
four factors combine to create a world where corporations have military backing and more power
than any nation state on earth. They may not all seem feasible in our world – the emergence of magic
certainly seems beyond belief.

But what if magic is merely undiscovered science? Physics experiments suggest instant travel, mind
reading via technology and any number of other ‘magical’ powers can be achieved through scientific
means. Not so romantic a notion perhaps as traditional magic, but potentially much more interesting.
On the same note, plague and war are a constant in human history, and the internet is certainly
something that could be attacked for strategic reasons, or even just amusement.

Corporations already hold significant power: this step in the evolution has certainly already occurred.
But the focus here is on how that power could develop into the full potential that exists in the
cyberpunk lore. The power they hold now may spread over the world and into almost every facet of
society, and it is easy enough to see the tragedy in it, but it is not absolute. So don’t imagine that it
can’t get worse. Some of us still have healthcare, accessible education and the ability to seek out free
media, even if it’s hard to find. Some of us might only have the illusion of freedom. But even that can
be taken away.

Nevertheless don’t take this too seriously, it’s merely a speculative journey through a few possibilities
among the infinite that exist. This is a series of articles that will follow changes already happening in
our world that could lead us towards a cyberpunk evolution. This article, the first, will explore the
potential of a plague to bring society to its knees before the might of the corporate elite.

However perhaps it is the cure - and not the plague - which matters most. It may be a leap in logic to
assume that the government will hold the world in a V for Vendetta style ransom by withholding the
cure for a disease they themselves created. However it is hardly a stretch to suggest that corporate
giants would deny medicine to the dying if they failed to offer the right price for it. In the right
situation, could corporations take advantage of this to swing the balance of power in their direction?

Only a wide scale epidemic - or even a pandemic - could really provide a scenario with enough
numbers to propel such a swing. At the moment, fatal epidemics primarily exist in the third world.
The most commonly known of these is of course AIDS - a true pandemic. While possessing no cure to
sell, medical corporations do have a drug that can prevent a pregnant mother from passing the
disease onto her unborn child. Unfortunately for many years they set the price tag in the West and
did not lower it for the third world, so very few could afford the drug, and even now that’s it’s been
lowered to more a more reasonable price, the costs of providing accessibility still prevents many
woman from benefiting from the drug. You might adopt the standard reaction and dismiss this
problem as one that belongs only in the world’s poorest countries. That could never happen here.
But would you be right?

Anyone who is aware of the healthcare situation in America would realise that those in the West, and
not just the poor, face many of the same problems. In the US without health insurance, if you can’t
afford medicine it will not be provided to you. America’s Deep South is the only first world region
where the average age of death is actually decreasing due to curable medical conditions. 40% of
America’s homeless became so as a result of medical costs. The situation is not so bad in other
countries like Australia, but signs certainly exist that we are on our way down that road. In this
interconnected little world, who’s to say their present doesn’t contain our future?

Tuberculosis is a disease that might make that future a very interesting one. TB is a worldwide
problem, that old classic used in movies to make characters enchantingly pale so they faint at the
most melodramatic of moments. Even today normal TB can kill in just a few months if left untreated.
However recently the disease has been mutating into more drug resistant strains, and last year France
produced the first strain of the virus to be immune to any drugs at all. Scientists need funding in
order to be able to research treatment before that single case multiplies into many, but the drug
companies have refused, as even in the West TB only tends to affect poor areas, leaving no potential
profit to inspire their funding.
So what happens if the untreatable strain of TB starts to spread? How many people will die before
funding is offered? Based on the millions who already suffer and die in the West due to denied
medical care, it could reach devastating proportions before the research needed even begins. By that
stage, whoever produces the treatment could have bargaining power no government could control.

If medical corporations do not even care enough now to offer free medicine to the sick, imagine facing
one with such absolute power. Show them your healthcare card, your modest pay check, or your
rejected insurance claim and ask for some compassion. Scream MEDIC repeatedly until they become
so frustrated they get the idea that if they hold off the treatment just a little longer, they might be
able to purge the world of some of those pesky poor and crazy homeless.

This is just one potential scenario. TB may slip us by without much impact, but epidemics are common
in history, and another will hit us eventually. On its own, this might not be enough to propel us in the
direction of Shadowrun’s corporate ruled world. But combined with the unique nature of modern
civilization the next serious epidemic could cause a fundamental shift in the structure of society.

A recent study featured by New Scientist author Debra MacKenzie suggested that the more complex a
society is the more weaknesses it accumulates. This level of complexity has a twofold effect. No
country is truly isolated or independent anymore, they rather exist in an interconnected web of
culture, trade and essentially all the systems upon which the smooth running of society rests. While
meaning that we can rely on a wide pool of resources in the everyday running of life, it also
conversely means that should something happen to cut off one of those vital supply routes, necessary
services such as medicine, food and fuel could become scarce. They are all kept in far more limited
supply than most realise. For example, the average American hospital only keeps two days worth of
supplies, relying on regular deliveries. Food and fuel are in similar situations. If truck drivers are
unable to deliver these vital services, the gap this leaves could create a severe breakdown in the
smooth running of society. A lack of fuel doesn’t just mean no cars or buses; it also will eventually
mean no food or medicine either. In this way, MacKenzie shows that modern civilization is both
incredibly complex, and as a result of that complexity, incredibly fragile. Many things could push it to
breaking point, and an epidemic is certainly one
of them. The resulting chaos could be
devastating.

In such a situation, even those with money and

power would be vulnerable, and a cure would
hold the hope that society could be restored. In
the hands of those who see disease as a
potential for profit, there could be no limit to
the demands they make or the power they seek.
And it would be easy to justify needing a
military force to protect such a precious
commodity from a desperate public. Such a
world could end up creating that very sharp
distinction between the poor and the rich that
defines a cyberpunk existence, and produce a
black market underworld that leeches off the
high tech advancements of the corporate elite.
Such futuristic advancements already find
uncanny parallels in the latest research into
weapons technology, biological enhancements
and neuroscience, which I will explore in future
articles.

Of course this is all wide eyed speculation on one potential future, and nothing more. For while we
may have all hoped that the LHC would tear a hole in space-time and suck us into a dimension where
Morrigan like succubi would enslave us to their wicked ways, it simply did not happen. Maybe when
it’s all fixed up again. Nevertheless, despite our best paranoid predictions things don’t always go
wrong. But history also tells us that eventually something will. This series will track the changes
suggesting that what does might end up being the cyberpunk evolution.

Article by Alanna Horgan

Originally posted on Shades of Sentience

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