Everything

Martial-arts expertise combines intellectual study, physical conditioning, practical experience, and mental concentration on the chosen discipline. As anyone who’s been in a real-life fight understands, physical reflexes matter more than intellectual strategy once blows start flying. And so, although Matrix-style “download-fu” makes for a cool fantasy (and might possibly work in the Digital Web), a character cannot “learn” practical martial arts through mental impressions alone.

This doesn’t keep people from trying to make it work; the Technocracy, Adepts, and other technomancers strive to perfect a functional “download technology” for martial mastery. The physical component, though, remains essential, at least in Meatspace environments. As Kade Lane learns – the hard way, repeatedly – in Ramez Naam’s novel Nexus, the “Bruce Lee” fighting program is worthless when he gets into real fights.