And, for an instant, she stared directly into those soft blue eyes and knew, with an instinctive mammalian certainty, that the exceedingly rich were no longer even remotely human.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that extreme wealth can alienate individuals from their humanity.
William Gibson's quote reflects a profound observation about how wealth can dehumanize those who possess it. The mention of 'soft blue eyes' symbolizes a connection to humanity, while the assertion that the 'exceedingly rich' are 'no longer even remotely human' highlights a disconnect that wealth can create, leading individuals to become estranged from empathy and genuine human connection.
In practice
In a discussion about social inequality, this quote can highlight the psychological impact of extreme wealth.
She knows, now, absolutely, hearing the white noise that is London, that Damien's theory of jet lag is correct: that her mortal soul is leagues behind her, being reeled in on some ghostly umbilical down the vanished wake of the plane that brought her here, hundreds of thousands of feet above the Atlantic. Souls can't move that quickly, and are left behind, and must be awaited, upon arrival, like lost luggage.
If you've read a lot of vintage science fiction, as I have at one time or another in my life, you can't help but realise how wrong we get it. I have gotten it wrong more times than I've gotten it right. But I knew that when I started; I knew that before I wrote a word of science fiction.
I think I'd probably tell you that it's easier to desire and pursue the attention of tens of millions of total strangers than it is to accept the love and loyalty of the people closest to us.
As a writer of fiction who deals with technology, I necessarily deal with the history of technology and the history of technologically induced social change. I roam up and down it in a kind of special way because I roam down it into history, which is invariably itself a speculative affair.
His eyes were eggs of unstable crystal, vibrating with a frequency whose name was rain and the sound of trains, suddenly sprouting a humming forest of hair-fine glass spines.
I don't have to write about the future. For most people, the present is enough like the future to be pretty scary.
Praise and blame, good and bad, even heat and cold, must be equally acceptable to us.
I ceased using words like optimism and pessimism a long time ago.
The single clenched fist lifted and ready, Or the open asking hand held out and waiting. Choose: For we meet by one or the other.
As soon as a woman's primary social value could no longer be defined as the attainment of virtuous domesticity, the beauty myth redefined it as the attainment of virtuous beauty. It did so to substitute both a new consumer imperative and a new justification for economic unfairness in the workplace where the old ones had lost their hold over newly liberated women.
Hell is having to execute a pointless act from which nothing ever comes except the need to do it again.
Tyler lies back and asks, "If Marilyn Monroe were alive right now, what would she be doing?" I say, goodnight. The headliner hangs down in shreds from the ceiling and Tyler says, "Clawing at the lid of her coffin.
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